


This Is Where I Leave You

by fanficfreshman



Category: Glee, This Is Where I Leave You - Fandom
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-06
Updated: 2018-03-30
Packaged: 2018-05-12 05:23:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 29,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5653993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fanficfreshman/pseuds/fanficfreshman
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No husband, no child, no dad, no job, no home, or anything else that would point to a life being lived with any success aside from her two Tony trophies currently in storage, along with most of her belongings. Rachel knew she wasn't that old, but she knew thirty-three was too old to have this much nothing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue: From Hero to Zero

**Prologue |** _**From Hero to Zero** _

Rachel Berry couldn’t be happier with the way things are going in her life right now. At thirty-three, she has won two Tonys, is starring in her sixteenth musical, and is married for six-going-on-seven years with her high school sweetheart and current Brooklyn Nets forward Finn Hudson.

She just finished rehearsals for her upcoming play, _Cloudburst_ , opening in two weeks. Their director, Larry, a male version of the Cheerios head coach Sue Sylvester, thankfully and miraculously ended rehearsals with a loud, “That’s it for today everybody! Please do the world a favor and take a shower. You all stink!”

She quickly headed home, four hours earlier than what she told Finn when she left early this morning. It was Finn’s 34th birthday, and they were going to celebrate it with a nice, quiet date at _Masa_. She was giving him a framed and signed Dallas Mavericks jersey from Dirk Nowitzki, his most favorite NBA player, as a gift. She also planned on wearing the sexy lingerie she bought earlier that week.

To say that Rachel Berry was excited was an understatement. She even over-tipped the taxi driver. She was having that kind of a day _._

She opened the door to a quiet house. She remembered Finn had practice that morning. _He may have lied down for a quick nap_ , she thought as she carried her big wrapped gift towards their bedroom. _This is quite heavy_. As she neared the door, she could hear a faint hum, and the floor vibrate a little. Finn was playing loud music. Rachel thanked the gods for giving her the foresight to have their bedroom walls soundproofed.

Finn liked playing music when he sleeps but since his wife doesn’t like it ( _Finn, honey, I am working with music all day I just need peace and quiet when I sleep_ , Rachel explained.), he cut the habit. One of the things Rachel loved about her husband.

Rachel opened the door with a smile, ready to wake her husband from his nap. It turned out she didn’t need to wake him up because he was wide awake, on his knees, with his back facing her, pushing, _thrusting_ (Rachel has always hated this word for being so crass) his hips toward a moaning woman, whose face Rachel has yet to see.

To say that Rachel Berry was shocked was an understatement.

With rap music (the singer was going on and on about tapping this and that ass) playing in the background, Rachel noiselessly sat down in the nearest chair she could find in the bedroom. She clutched the edges of her gift, fearing she would lose control, and it would fall to the ground and make a big noise. She did not want to disturb Finn _now_. Maybe later, but not now. Rachel was still trying to grasp the fact that her husband, her high school sweetheart, is fucking somebody who is not her, on his birthday. And they seem to be having so much fun.

Rachel did not know how long she sat there looking at Finn’s ass clench and unclench to the beat of the music blaring from the speakers. But the realization that she didn’t want to be there if and when Finn and the woman climaxed, took her out of the trance she was in.

Her first impulse was to turn off the horrendous music. Finn jolted in surprise, and in the process pulled out of the woman he was fucking. The said woman screamed in surprise not because she saw the wife of the man she was fucking but because Finn pulled out abruptly. From her widened eyes and flushed expression, Rachel guessed she was probably near her orgasm.

She tried to remember the last time Finn made her orgasm. She was blanking but she wasn’t sure if it was because of the shock or because it was _so_ long ago that she couldn’t remember.

The woman seemed familiar to Rachel. Then it slowly hit her, like an old rusty incoming train, that this was her director’s wife, Jen. _Larry's Jen._ She looked very different from her polished look in the Happy Holidays card Larry and Jen sent them last year. No clothes, no make-up, just a bewildered-turning-embarrassed look on her face.

Rachel remained quiet, maintaining eye contact with the pillow in the middle of the bed. Her pillow. Her bed. Her room. Her husband. _Now it’s gone. Nothing is mine anymore._

The room was so quiet one could literally hear it if a pin falls. She could feel Finn and Jen waiting for her to make the first move, the first noise. She thought of leaving, of walking away, running as fast as she could. But somehow that didn’t feel right to her. It was enough that Finn and Jen drove her out of her marriage.

She cleared her throat. “Please get out of my house.”

Then, the noise came. Finn started to babble his apologies and Jen eerily kept saying, “Rachel please.” Rachel had no idea what she was saying please for. Nor did she care.

They were starting to get on her nerves. All things considered, she expected them to follow her one wish, to have a time alone, but they didn’t. The questions started creeping in Rachel's mind. She hated herself for asking, “How long?”

Ironically, that drove Finn and Jen to silence. She looked Finn in the eye and asked, “How long?”

After a beat, Finn replied in his most quiet of voices, “About a year.”

 _A year._ She let that sit in her brain for minute. A part of her expected, even wished, he’d say “since last week” or “since last month” to tell her how temporary, how fleeting it was. Maybe then she could find it in herself to forgive Finn. To chalk it up as a mistake. But twelve months is a long time, if one really thought about it. It was not just _one_ mistake she would have to forgive him for but a _series_ of mistakes. A year means they have an anniversary or will be having one soon. From where does one count, really? First meaningful glance? First kiss? First sex? A year also means they have had a lot of firsts. It was nauseating to think about for Rachel.

Rachel could feel the tears starting to flood her eyes; threatening to break open the dam she has built in a span of minutes. “Please leave. _Now!_ ”

As she watched Finn and Jen scrambled for their clothes, Rachel noticed that the entire time she was speaking, she was holding on to the edges of the frame. Her gift to her husband. Neither was true now.

Rachel, in an act of selfishness and an eerie form of revenge, decided to keep the gift. She did not want Finn, or anyone for that matter, to know what great lengths she went through just to get that gift. She personally went to Nowitzki’s agent’s office to ask for the favor, traveled to Dallas to visit the athlete’s home and sang _Let It Go_ with his four year old daughter until she passed out from all the excitement.

Rachel held on tighter to the frame, as Finn and Jen made their way out of the bedroom and, ultimately, the apartment. They were still muttering apologies under their breaths.

As the door shut close, she let go of a sigh she didn’t realize she was holding. And she cried her hear out. Not the loud over-the-top kind that she did after she choked on her first NYADA audition but the quiet painful sob of a grown woman realizing she lost something she held dear since she was sixteen.

\-----

Rachel Berry was wired to prepare for and bask in success. Her parents have instilled in her the value of hard work and the importance of success. Ever since she was kid, she was winning. At two months shy of being a three year old, Rachel won her first singing contest. She has won every contest she joined, even the non-musical ones.

But Rachel really _learned_ the importance of success when she experienced her first loss.  She will never forget the day she lost a 50-meter track and field contest to Tina Cohen-Chang, the Changs’ quiet bespectacled then-seven year old daughter. The contest was organized by a group of mothers in their neighborhood as a part of a weekend-long family day, where families go up against each other in various events. All in the spirit of fun, they said.

It was the worst day of young Rachel’s six year old life. She bit back the tears as she saw Tina celebrating with her family, jumping up and down, laughing, while hers was quiet, trying their best to not say thing that would upset the youngest yet most determined member of the family. She vowed never to feel the same again.

But, as Rachel was starting to realize, life has a way of sneaking up on people. One does all her best to avoid the things that scare her the most and yet, somehow, some way, it still happens. And thirty-three-year old Rachel was not in any way prepared to handle failure a million times greater than that loss to Tina Cohen-Chang two decades ago.

She cried the whole night of Finn’s birthday, and fell asleep on the couch in the living room. The next day, she woke up dizzy, remembered Finn and his infidelity, and started feeling hatred. She hated the bed, the room, this apartment she was in. She hated herself for being stupid enough to miss the signs. She read it somewhere (or maybe her mom told her) that adultery is the kind of crime that generates evidence. A smudged lipstick, a strategically place bite mark, the smell of a someone else’s perfume, decreased libido, missed dinners and periodically scheduled weekends away with teammates. It was all there, Rachel started to realize. And she hated herself for not noticing.

Another thing she hated was that she missed rehearsal for the first time in _years_ just because she overslept. She chose to ignore the fact that she overslept because she cried all night mourning her failed marriage.

She met with Larry, who was about to tear her a new one for skipping rehearsal but after one look at her tired eyes and overall weary disposition decided to shut his mouth, to formally withdraw from _Cloudburst_. He was disappointed at Rachel.

“Rachel I don’t care what it is you’re being bothered with, that’s caused all _this_ ,” he said, gesturing to her general direction, “but you can’t let it affect your career. You’re good, you know that. But the world will not be waiting for you to be _Rachel Berry_ again. They will find another Rachel Berry.” He added, “That’s how the world goes.”

Rachel looked at Larry’s eyes and said, “I just… need some time off.”

For someone with Larry’s reputation for snark and “I don’t have time for amateurs” attitude, he was a good guy. He was a cross between a father and an older brother. Most of the time, he gets on people's nerves, but on his good days he gives the sincerest of hugs. He whispered, “You’re going to be okay, princess.”

Rachel chuckled. He used to call her “princess” as a degrading pet name for Rachel when they first met and worked on their first play together. Through the years, it has become a secret code between them, which connotes sincerity and support. Sort of a safe word, but between friends.

Judging by Larry’s actions, Rachel guessed he still didn’t know about Jen and Finn. For a moment she thought of telling him but decided to let it go. _Let Jen ruin her own marriage_.

Just like that she had no job to go to the next day. She had no husband to look pretty for. No marriage to strengthen. Soon, she will have no apartment to go back to.

After her meeting with Larry, Rachel met with her lessor, a forty year old Wall Street guy named Michael. He and Rachel’s then-co star David just broke up and were renting out the apartment they co-own because no one wanted to live in it (“Too many memories,” Michael said with a sad smile.) but they were told it was not financially wise to sell it then.

Starting a family in the home of a just-broken-up couple should’ve raised warning flags in Rachel’s mind. As a performer, she believed in little superstitions, after all. But young, naïve Rachel believed in the power of love, and in Finn.

 _One shouldn’t really put all her chips in one place_ , she thought.

Rachel and Finn had three years left in their lease. Michael wasn’t too happy that she wanted to pre-terminate the contract but after telling him in simple and concise terms (“I am divorcing Finn. I don’t want to stay in the apartment and he cheated so he doesn’t have a vote on what happens”), he agreed, as long as Rachel pays the pre-termination fee stated in the contract.

It is in this moment that Rachel had a realization. The world won't cut her some slack just because she got cheated on by her husband of six-almost-seven years and that she just quit her job. She still has to pay pre-termination fee.

She sighed, signed the papers and promised to be out by the end of the week. No marriage, no job, no house.

Sarcastically, she asked herself: _Now, what else is left for Rachel Berry to lose?_

\-----

Her older sister Santana answered her question, exactly a week later, “Dad’s dead.”

“What?” She sat up straighter on the couch which has been her bed for the past week.

After meeting Larry and Michael, she had a quiet lunch at a little known restaurant called _Puzzles_ where she figured out what to do with her life. Well, the logistics part of it. Not the substantial part. She rented out a storage unit located on 622 West 14 th Street. All her non-essential things (anything related to Finn and their marriage) were kept in storage while she rented out a smaller place for one person as far away from Brooklyn as possible.

As of the moment, she was not ready to talk to, or even see, Finn. She cancelled all his calls, which wasn’t _that_ frequent; opted out of social gatherings organized by common friends who remained clueless as to the status of their marriage; completely ignored Kurt’s, her brother-in-law, invitation to lunch, and so on.

Rachel was surprised at how easy it was to disappear from one’s life, if one really wants to.

She heard Santana say, “He died about an hour ago.”

“I thought they said… he had more time.”

“Obviously they lied or, worse, didn’t know what they were doing and are more incompetent than we expected,” she replied.

She wasn’t surprised that sister was more concerned about the doctors’ hidden ineptitude rather than their father’s death. Santana has perfected the art of not caring, along with her other perfected skills such as, but not limited to, not showing emotions, other than anger or hate.

“ _Santana_.” She asked, “How’s mom?”

“She’s mom. You know. She asked me how much to tip the nurses,” she shared, sounding quite proud.

Santana may have gotten her snark from their mother. Or maybe it was a self-developed, non-genetic skill.

“Dad is dead,” Rachel said it aloud, while Santana droned on about the doctors and nurses, and their shared qualities—ineptitude and mediocrity. She clearly remembered it was Santana’s idea for their dad to stay in this hospital.

Rachel was shaken out of her reverie when Santana said, “It gets better.”

“ _Santana!_ Better really? Do you hear yourself?”

“Okay, that came out wrong.”

“You think?”

“He asked us to sit shiva.”

Rachel was confused. She knew what shiva was. She also knew she's three-fourths Jewish—the race, not the religion—but doesn’t remember her father being a practicing Jewish in his recent years. In fact, she could not recall the last time their father has been to temple.

“Wasn’t he an atheist?”

Santana explained, “Dad’s a Jewish atheist. Apparently, it’s a thing… once a Jew, always a Jew. And this is what he wanted.” She continued, “I don’t know the specifics, Rach. But the funeral is tomorrow morning. I’m flying with the kids tonight. Sebastian’s at a meeting in San Francisco. He’ll catch the red-eye.”

Sebastian, Santana’s husband is a well-known sports analyst for ESPN. As far as Rachel knew he gets paid to watch basketball games and comment on them during a live telecast. He also has a show called, _What’s the Score_ , where they talk about even  _more_ basketball. He traveled a lot because he had to watch the games and interview players. Rachel knew there was a time Santana preferred that Sebastian got a job that would allow him to spend time with their kids more. But she's sure that time has passed and, nowadays, Santana gets a thrill out of spending her husband’s money.

“You’re bringing the kids?”

“Believe me, I’d rather not. But seven days is just too long to leave them alone with the nanny.”

The kids are Cole and Andrew, aged three and one, cherub cheeked boys who got their father’s devil-may-care attitude and their mother’s sass. Their two best qualities, as Santana would always point out.

“Seven days?”

“That’s how long it takes to sit shiva.”

“We’re not really going to do this, are we?”

“It was dad’s dying wish,” Santana said with a tone of seriousness and a hint of sincerity.

“Noah's going along with this?”

“He’s the one who told me about it, and he’s on board.”

Noah, or Puck, is the Berrys' eldest child. He's a member of the US Army. He spent nine months in Afghanistan, and came back with a permanent limp and scowl on his face. He manages the Berry's sportings good store in Lima and is married to a woman named Sugar. They don't have kids and don't seem to be too keen on having any despite their parents' prodding.

Santana went on, "I have yet to talk to Jake. But you know him. He'll just show up once he reads the messages I sent him."

Jake is their youngest brother. He was born five years after Rachel while his older siblings were born just two years apart. He was the tallest and most good-looking Berry child, and had his family’ best features—Rachel’s eyes, Santana’s nose and Puck’s mouth/smile, his mother’s charisma and his father’s mysteriousness. He knew how to harness the gifts God gave him and grew up to be a ladies’ man. He was also tactile, expressive with his emotions—unlike most Berrys who liked to use a combination of stoicism, snark, wit and flair when dealing with complicated emotions. Nobody in his family knew what he does for a living and he somehow gets by daily without asking money from their parents. But Santana and Rachel had previously bailed him out of jail a few times.

“I haven’t seen him in a year.” Rachel added, “I hopes he makes it. He’ll be devastated if he doesn’t.”

“And speaking of screwed-up siblings, how’s your own Greek tragedy coming along? Still wallowing in self-pity?” Older sisters are usually motherly towards their younger siblings but Santana acts like an overprotective but highly annoying older brother.

“ _Santana_ ,” Rachel said, closing her eyes. She could feel a headache starting.

“Jesus, Rach. I was just expressing concern.”

“I’m sure you do.”

“Don’t get all passive aggressive. I get that enough from Sebastian.”

“I’ll see you in Lima. And please don’t tell anyone about the divorce,” Rachel pleaded. “I’ll tell mom and the boys after shiva, okay.”

Santana sighed. “Fine, be that way,” she said, as if Rachel sucked the fun out of everything. “Bye.”

It was Rachel’s turn to sigh as she put her phone down.

No husband, no child, no dad, no job, no home, or anything else that would point to a life being lived with any success aside from her two Tony trophies currently in storage, along with most of her belongings. Rachel knew she wasn't _that_ old, but she knew thirty-three was too old to have this much nothing.

 _What a_ great _time to be alive._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! I recently watched the 2014 film, This Is Where I Leave You, and imagined (as I always do) if and how the plot could work with Faberry as the lead characters. I also read the book of the same title by Jonathan Tropper from which the film was based. 
> 
> I combined the things I liked from the book and the film, used the characters from Glee (and a few details from the TV show, too), and let my imagination run wild. I’m currently working on the rest of the chapters. I plan to finish this work (maybe under 10 chapters) before January ends. Let me know what you think in the comments!


	2. We open at the close

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Title is from Harry Potter!

**Chapter 1 | _We_ _open at the close_  
**

As Rachel made her way towards family and friends gathered around her father’s burial plot, she silently thanked the heavens for her great timing. Her flight got in Lima just in time for the ceremony but not too early that she would have to converse with guests. She drove to Mount Zion Cemetery straight from the airport. Her luggage was still in the trunk of the rental car parked at the foot of hill, along with the cars of the funeral-goers.

Ever since she was a child, Rachel loved the attention she got from performing and winning. Naturally, she also loved the attention and praises—sincere or otherwise—people showered her with whenever she attended high school reunions, homecomings, weddings or any kind of family get-together. They admired what she had achieved on Broadway and her life in New York with a well-known basketball player. But today, she wasn’t too keen on speaking about her career, which is temporarily on-hold, and her marriage, which is inexistent, as of the moment.

When the dust has settled, so to speak, what surprised Rachel most about all of it was that Finn didn’t bother her with calls and text messages to apologize or explain his side or request for time to meet him. It was disconcerting to Rachel who was used to being wooed and apologized to. When they were dating in high school and up to time they were still happily married, Finn was always the first to apologize to her when they had fights. She expected him to call the morning after. He didn’t.

Instead, Finn called a day later, when he found out from Michael that she pre-terminated their lease. Even then, he didn’t apologize. He only said, “I talked to Mike,” Rachel bit her tongue to keep herself from correcting him that Michael did not like being called ‘Mike’, “and he agreed to lease the place to me after... after you move out.”

Rachel composed herself. She had the urge to cry, then, but she didn’t want to appear more pathetic. She said, “Okay. I will come by with the moving vans later today. Please be out by the time I get there.”

She hasn’t heard from him since.

Rachel only took what was necessary—her precious coffee maker, her La-Z-Boy recliner, her turntable and record collection, to name a few—and left as soon as she could. It saddened her to realize that she was, finally, driven out of her home for six-almost-seven years.

That night, the finality of it all struck Rachel as she sat on her recliner, in her new but much smaller living room. Finn did not ask for an apology and Rachel couldn’t find it in herself to forgive him for something he wasn’t sorry for. Maybe he was too happy to be finally free to do the things he wanted—play music while sleeping, sleep with the bimbos he meets left and right, and call their landlord “Mike” all the time.

Rachel’s resentment towards Finn started to grow. _Wasn’t there a universal rule that the one who cheated waits for the other to move on, or at least hook up with someone, before he/she gets a life?!_

She immediately called her lawyer and told him she’s filing for a divorce citing irreconcilable differences. She requested to make it as quiet as possible—not wanting to be the laughingstock of New York.

Rachel knew her mother wouldn’t approve of the divorce, regardless of her reasons. Telling her mom and her siblings before they spend seven days together would be a disaster so Rachel decided to tell them after shiva. By then, Rachel can just walk out when they start expressing their unfavorable reactions.

_Now, if only Santana could keep her mouth shut for seven days._

At the funeral, Rachel approached her mother, who was standing nearest to the casket, as the dutiful widow she is, impeccably dressed in black with eyes hidden behind sunglasses. To her mother’s left was Holly Holiday-Pierce, her mother’s best friend and the Berry’s long-time neighbor. She hugged her mom and whispered, “Mom. Holly.”

Holly reached out and rubbed her arm. Rachel was not surprised that she felt more comforted by Holly’s gesture than her mom’s. Holly always knew the right things to say, especially when Shelby was more committed to maintaining her “tough love” brand of parenting.

Shelby, as if on cue, asked, “Where’s Finn, honey?”

Rachel took a deep breath. _Here we go._

“He’s...not with me.” She saw Santana, standing right behind their mother and Holly, smirking, clearly listening in on their conversation. “He has a bulging disk.”

Santana chuckled, which startled a few guests.

Rachel glared at her older sister. It was the most logical excuse she could think of to explain Finn’s absence. He was, after all, an athlete and was prone to sporting injuries. She has also researched, on her mobile phone while she drove from the airport, that a bulging disk was a fairly common injury for male athletes and required bed rest. In Rachel’s mind, it seemed to be a solid alibi but Santana’s reaction made her second guess her decision.

She continued, “It was a gym accident. The doctor wanted him to take a complete bed rest. He was devastated he couldn’t be here.”

“That’s awful. I hope he recovers soon.” Shelby’s tone was so neutral, Rachel wasn’t sure if her mom was genuinely concerned for Finn or if she could see through Rachel’s lie and would call her out on it later.

Silence descended on them as they waited for the ceremony to start. Rachel looked around and saw her eldest brother Puck standing to Holly’s left, with his wife Sugar, a petite woman who, at thirty-five, still looked like she got carded at the liquor store. Rachel was surprised when Puck married someone so different from him—she was warm, cheerful, a little child-like in her ways. She had brown hair and looked very different from the women Puck used to date. Woman, Rachel corrected herself. She had an unconfirmed hunch that the reason he married Sugar was because she didn’t (even remotely) resemble his deceased high school girlfriend Lauren.

It wouldn’t be beyond Puck to marry someone who didn’t remind him of his long lost love just to protect himself from future heartaches. Rachel used to pity Sugar for being oblivious to all this but now she envied Puck for having a good plan. At least Sugar stayed, she thought.

She made eye contact with Sebastian, Santana’s husband, and they exchanged polite nods. She never really understood her siblings’ choice of spouses. Like in Puck’s case, Rachel could only guess why Santana married him—the epitome of a grown-up school jock, the ones Santana loathed in high school—despite being in love with Brittany, Holly’s only daughter.

But, Rachel figured, if she couldn’t understand her own husband and marriage, she couldn’t expect to understand her siblings’ marriages and choice of spouses. She shook her thoughts away and focused at the task at hand.

She looked down at her father’s casket. She let out a deep sigh. _Dad._

Her mother spoke, “It’s okay to cry, honey. Or laugh. There’s no correct response.”

“I think I’ll just…stand here quietly in sad reflection.”

Her mother was a former Broadway performer but she was more well-known for her show choir coaching success (she was a 10-time National Show Choir Champion Coach) and her best-selling book, _Cradle and Awe, a Mothers' Guide to Honing Your Child's Inner Mozart_ (or any performer, for that matter). Even if most of the Berry children didn’t pursue music as a profession, Rachel was a breathing, living and singing proof that her mother knew what she was doing, or at least what she wrote. The book sold like hotcakes and had to be reprinted after Rachel won her first Tony.

The rabbi broke Rachel’s reverie. “Today we say good-bye to Hiram Berry, beloved husband to Shelby and dutiful father to four lovely children, a dear brother and a cherished friend.”

The rabbi was Jacob Ben Israel of Temple Israel. He went to high school with the three older Berry children and had a huge crush on Rachel. Puck called him “Jewfro” because he had unruly-bordering-on-unkempt hair. He and Santana exploited his admiration for Rachel, and made him their personal errand boy and gossip source and spreader.

He continued, “Hiram was never a big fan of rituals…”

“Will you look at that,” Santana whispered to no one in particular. But everyone within earshot followed her gaze across the cemetery to the access road, where a black Porsche had noisily pulled up. Their youngest brother Jake came out of his car like a movie star. He knew he was being watched and performed his well-practiced stride.

Shelby signaled Rabbi Jacob to stop.

Jake broke into a slight jog towards the group. He stopped right in front of his mother, not even out of breath. “ _Mommy_ ,” he said in that tone that annoyed Rachel to no end, and gave her a hug.

She hugged him back and stated the obvious, “You came.” She was visibly overjoyed. Jake is her baby, and he’s spent his life reeling in the slack as fast as she cut it for him.

“Of course I did.” He looked around to exchange pleasantries with Rachel, Holly, Puck, Sugar, Santana and Sebastian. He high-fived Santana’s kids who, of course, loved it and giggled endlessly as if to say, _finally, the cool uncle’s here_.

Rabbi Jacob cleared his throat. “Are we all set? Mind if I keep going?”

Jake turned and saw who the rabbi was. “Holy shit, Jewfro! Sorry. Shit.”

The flustered rabbi told everyone, “Nobody calls me Jewfro anymore. That was a childhood nickname.” After a beat he added, “So now you know that.”

“Could you believe this?” Jake looked at Santana, still amused. She smirked back but kept quiet. Shelby put a hand on his arm and he stopped.

The rabbi continued reading his psalm out loud. Afterwards he called on Puck to come forward, “I invite Noah, Hiram’s eldest son, to say a few words.”

Jake whispered to Rachel, “Jewfro is a man of God now. The world never stops being weird.”

“Jake,” Rachel chastised her brother because her mom and sister wouldn’t.

Puck spoke, “Dad would’ve hated this funeral. It’s just one of the things I loved about him. He would be counting down the minutes so he could go down the hill, turn on the game and he would talk about how full of shit everybody was, and that we didn’t really miss him.” He started to tear up. “And he would’ve been wrong. We do miss him.”

Rachel couldn’t help but get misty-eyed at that. She heard her mom, Holly and even Jake sniffle.

 _Dad’s really gone._ She closed her eyes and said a quiet prayer for her eccentric family.

Their dad has always been the glue that held their family together. He was quiet but constant. He perfectly balanced their mother’s flair for dramatics. He gave sound advice, when sought, and warm hugs, when needed. With him gone, Rachel was worried for her family. They were barely able to keep it together when he was alive, and she feared the coming days will only finally break them apart.

_Dad, please help us._

\------

After the funeral, the family reconvened at Knob’s End, the cul-de-sac at the end of Lima Heights, where the Berry house stood. The house, a large white colonial, stood at the center of the dead end, where the blacktop blossomed into a wide circle, ideal for street hockey and bike riding. The house was used as a negative landmark when people gave directions to any home or business on Lima Heights. If you see the big white house, then you’ve gone too far, they said.

Hiram Berry was obsessive about maintaining the house. He was a handy guy, always painting and staining, cleaning out the gutters, changing out pipes, power-washing the patio. He was an electrician by trade, but he gave it up to go into business, and he missed working with his hands, couldn’t face the weekend without the prospect of manual labor.

The cracked and flaking paint around the window frames, the ugly brown water stain just below the roofline and the bluestones on the front walk that rattled like loose teeth were a reminder that the house’s keeper hasn’t been around for quite a long time. The growing moss on the sidewalk that Rachel stepped over eerily reminded her of the slowly spreading cancer that finally consumed her father’s life.

As the Berry’s walked to their front porch after the funeral, they were greeted by Holly’s daughter, Brittany. She was a year older than Rachel and was in the same year as her in high school but Brittany became closer to the older Berry daughter, Santana. It was no secret that they dated until Santana graduated from high school and went to college in Louisville on a cheerleading scholarship. They had some sort of falling out that neither the Berry’s nor the Pierce’s knew what it was about. All Rachel knew was that it was serious enough to drive Santana into a marriage to a person she obviously didn’t love.

Rachel curiously watched as Santana walked up to Brittany. She was surprised when the two shared a long hug. A few words were said, but their voices were close to whispers that Rachel couldn’t make out what they were.

When her sister pulled away, it was Rachel’s cue to step up the porch and walk by Brittany. She said, “Hi, Britt. It’s good to see you. How are you?”

“Living the dream,” she replied with a smile.

Since they were kids, Rachel didn’t really understood what Brittany said most of the time, and she didn’t expect to understand her now that they were adults. But Brittany’s oddity reminded her she was home.

\------

“Noah and Sugar live an hour away how come they have to sleep here?” she asked her mom.

Rachel didn’t want to be a diva about it but the sleeping arrangements she was given was beyond acceptable. She was a two-time Tony award winning performer but her mother decided to give Rachel’s room to Puck and his wife because with his injured leg he would have a hard time limping up and down the basement stairs—which left Rachel with no place to stay but in their obviously unkempt basement, also Puck’s former bedroom.

As kids, Puck and Jake shared a room until Puck sprouted pubic hair and moved down to the basement, where the hiss and clank of the boiler would drown out his Led Zeppelin, his phone calls with girlfriends, and his ever busier masturbation schedule. He had been allowed to furnish the basement as he saw fit, which is why the sofa bed cannot be fully opened without hitting the corner of the Ping-Pong table, which is itself positioned against a support column.

 _And the temperature!_ Rachel gingerly thought. There seemed to be a heater somewhere but she wasn’t completely sure if it would create the ideal temperature to keep her vocal chords warm at night. _And I have to stay here for seven days!_

“I want all my kids under one roof again,” Shelby replied. “Obviously when Finn gets here we’ll make different arrangements.” She asked, “But this is okay right?”

Rachel looked at her mom’s sad eyes, and replied, “There is much to be desired but I guess this will do.”

Shelby said as she walked up the stairs, “Come up soon, visitors will be here any minute.”

\-----

“You’re shitting us, right?” Jake said aloud, as he and his siblings look at the five low folding chairs with thick wooden frames and faded vinyl upholstery placed against the window, facing the living room.

Rabbi Jacob arrived, a couple of hours after the funeral, with three volunteers from the Hebrew Burial Society to deliver the mourning supplies. They rearranged furniture and set things up with a hushed military precision, after which Rabbi Jacob gathered the four Berry siblings in the living room.

The mirror above the mantle has been clouded over with some kind of soapy white spray. The furniture has all been pushed to the perimeter of the room, and thirty or so white plastic catering chairs have been unfolded and placed in three rows facing the five low chairs. There are two silver collection plates placed on the piano. People paying their respects to the family can make dollar contributions to the burial society or to a local children’s cancer society. A few lonely bills have been placed on each plate like tips.

In the front hall, a thick candle formed in a tall glass is lit and placed on the table, next to Santana’s baby monitor. This is the shiva candle, and there is enough wax in the glass for the candle to burn for seven days.

“They’re shiva chairs,” Rabbi Jacob explained. “You sit low to the ground as a sign of mourning. Originally, the bereaved sat on the floor. Over time, the concept has evolved.”

“What’s with the mirrors?” It was Santana’s turn to ask.

“It’s customary to remove or cover all the mirrors in a house of mourning,” he said. “We’ve fogged up all the bathroom mirrors as well. This is a time to avoid any and all impulses toward personal vanity and simply reflect on your father’s life.”

Santana didn’t look like she bought any of it but she kept quiet.

Rachel knew this was the perfect time to bring up her suggestion. “Don’t some people sit shiva for just three days?”

“Yes, I’ve seen that, that’s a thing,” Santana quickly affirmed.

Jake followed suit. “Wow, can we do that?”

It was Puck’s turn to add. “Maybe we could do that.”

They were on a roll. The Berry children disagree on everything but whenever it came to getting away from obligations—especially religious traditions—they can suddenly come together and make a lean, mean arguing team.

Rachel added, “Maybe that could be _our_ thing.”

Rabbi Jacob was getting visibly frustrated with them. He raised his voice and said, “It can’t be your thing. There is no such thing.”

Santana added, “We could pioneer that.”

He raised his voice, almost a shout. “We can’t do that. Nobody here is pioneering anything because the word shiva is Hebrew for _seven_.”

Growing up with them, Rabbi Jacob knew how persuasive they could get. Even if he did hold a soft spot for Rachel, he wouldn’t let them use that to get away from the seven-day tradition. He added with a little more conviction to his voice, “Seven days, no work, no travel. Your asses stay on those seats. That’s it. Those are the rules.”

“Well, I would like to find a word for three because…” Rachel started to argue back when Shelby’s stern voice said, “Stop it!” startling them all to silence. “This is your father’s wish and you’re negotiating? He was not a perfect husband or a perfect father but he sure is better than most.”

Santana started to complain.

Shelby glared at her. “No! Your father had one final request and we are going to honor it.” She added, as she walked towards the middle of the five chairs, “This is going to be hard, uncomfortable. And we’re going to be on each other’s nerves. But for the next seven days you are all my children again, and you are all grounded.” She took a seat and looked at her children. “Come on, sit down.”

As the siblings, defeated, gingerly took their seats, Sugar quickly offered to take Santana’s crying one-year old for a nap.

Santana quickly handed over her child and, as she sat beside Puck, said, “You should put a baby in that woman, ASAP.”

“And be miserable like you? No thanks,” he countered.

Rabbi Jacob said with enthusiasm. “Okay, well, this is great. I could tell it’s going to be a really good experience. So I’m just going to let you,” he slapped Jake’s hand away, which was aiming for his hair, “uh, sit here a bit, reconnect. I will be back later to make sure that everybody’s okay.”

“Take care. I’ll see you soon. Be good,” were the rabbi’s parting words.

After he left, everyone sat in silence.

“What happens now?” Santana asked.

Shelby suggested, “We haven’t been together in ages why don’t you take some time to catch up?”

Santana and Puck looked at each other, remembered the words they exchanged just a few minutes ago and decided to remain quiet. Rachel was about to initiate a conversation with Jake when his phone rang, filling the room with sounds of someone rapping about “Bitches ain’t shit but hoes and trix!”

Jake gave his mom a reassuring smile and answered his phone.

Rachel suggested, “As an aside, you should put that on vibrate, for the next seven days.”

He answered his phone for a second, and said to his family, “She’s here,” as if they were all waiting for this unknown female guest. He rushed outside.

Shelby and her kids watch from the window as Jake welcomed a much older woman with a hug.

“Who is that? Is that his lawyer?” Puck asked.

Jake and the woman kissed. Passionately.

“Okay, not his lawyer,” Puck corrected himself.

Santana rolled her eyes. “Why couldn’t she be? It wouldn’t be beyond Jake to be doing his lawyer.”

As Jake and the mystery woman made their way to the house, everybody scrambled back to their seats.

“Everyone this is Emma,” Jake announced, hugging the woman from behind. “My fiancée,” he added.

Shelby was shocked. She removed her glasses and said, “What?” The woman appeared to Shelby as someone nearer her age than her son’s.

Emma was quick to correct Puck, “Engaged to be engaged actually.”

All three older Berry children made sounds of approval. “That makes more sense,” Rachel pointed out loud.

“I’m sorry to be meeting you all under such sad circumstances,” Emma said.

Cole, Santana’s son, walked in, carrying his potty chair, and announced to Emma, “I’m going to poop!”

Sebastian walked in, too, still on his phone, now on headset, talking about a triple-double or something.

Jake whispered in Emma’s ear, “That’s Sebastian. My brother-in-law. He’s an ass.” He made the introductions to the rest of his family.

Sugar welcomed Emma enthusiastically, and good-naturedly joked, “Get out while you still can.”

“Hey,” Jake complained.

“Noah,” his mom reprimanded him.

Jake was about to complain again—like the man-child he was—but Emma was quick to diffuse the situation. She turned to Shelby and extended a hand, “Mrs. Berry, it is a tremendous honor to meet you. Your book, _Cradle and Awe_ was really an important book for me.”

All four Berry children groaned.

Shelby explained to a confused Emma, “My children are not very proud of my life’s work.”

Jake said, “Not now, mom.”

Santana butted in, “Every kid in Puck’s class knew he used to jerk off using an oven mitt.”

Puck clarified, “That didn’t happen.”

“It happened,” Shelby countered, and Sugar snickered.

“Every guy I met expected me to put out,” Santana added.

“You had a very healthy sexual curiosity,” Shelby commented.

“Which you documented in detail,” Santana continued, “after reading my diary.”

“Secrets are cancelled in this family,” was Shelby’s reply.

Emma, again in an effort to dispense with the growing tension, “Well, _Cradle and Awe_ was the inspiration to my dissertation. So I would like to think that your family’s dysfunction helped me get my PhD.”

Awkward silence filled the room.

Jake needlessly explained, “Emma’s also a therapist, mom.”

“I gathered.”

“She was my therapist, actually,” Jake explained further.

Emma was quick to clarify, “Well right, but once we realized that we had feelings for each other, I naturally had to refer him to a colleague.”

Emma’s explanation was drowned out with a scream from Sebastian, “ _Jesus Christ what is wrong with you?!_ ”

Realizing that it was directed at their son Cole, Santana yelled back, “Don’t yell at him!”

“He threw poop at me. How was I supposed to react?” Sebastian defended himself.

“He's three years old you asshole,” she yelled back, as she carried away her crying son.

Sebastian walked away from the living room, muttering under his breath. Jake led Emma to his room to avoid the commotion. Sugar went to the kitchen to find cleaning supplies to scrub the poop off the rug.

Amidst the yelling and foot stomping, Puck, Rachel and Shelby remained seated quietly on their shiva chairs.

“To clarify,” Rachel leaned towards her mother, “today counts as one of the seven, right?”

Shelby nodded with a sigh.

\-----

Sugar and Emma were helping Holly in the kitchen. Brittany, since she wasn't obliged to sit shiva or stay around the house, went back to the dance studio to teach a couple of afternoon classes. Sebastian was nowhere to be seen but was still around the house, probably trying to do as much as work he could.

All the Berry children sat on their low chairs, feeling sheepish and uncomfortable, next to their mother, who looked as calm and composed as ever.

Jake was the first to break the silence and asked, “So what happens now?”

“People will come,” Shelby answered.

“How do they know when to come?” he asked again, more worried that they were sitting in low chairs for nothing.

“We are not the first people to ever sit shiva,” Puck grumbled.

“People will come,” their mother repeated.

“Oh, people will come, Ray,” Jake intoned, doing his best James Earl Jones. “People will most definitely come.” Jake is a repository of random snatches of film dialogue and song lyrics. To make room for all of it in his brain, he apparently cleared out all the areas where things like reason and common sense are stored. When triggered, he will quote thoughtlessly, like some kind of savant.

Puck, somehow, had enough, and said, "Shut up Jake. No one cares."

Jake took offense. "What's the matter with you? Oh yeah right, you've had a stick up your ass since you signed up for the Army. Oh wait no. You've had that since—”

Fortunately for everyone, before Jake could go to No Man's Land, also known as the topic of the death of Puck's beloved high school girlfriend, the doorbell rang.

Everyone, other than Jake and Puck, welcomed the intrusion of guests—somber-faced neighbors coming to pay their respects. Rachel realized that the reason for filling the shiva house with visitors is most likely to prevent the mourners from tearing each other limb from limb.

\-----

One of the guests was Ken Tanaka, Puck’s football coach in high school. He still had a beer belly and his penchant for tucking his tight shirts into this belt.

Since shiva chairs, by design, were lower than the chairs of the visitors, Rachel’s (and most likely her mom’s and siblings’, too) view tended to be up the nostrils and skirts of people seated directly in front of them. Rachel was happy Mr. Tanaka was not seated in front of her. From the way Shelby was so focused on Mr. Tanaka’s face, Rachel was willing to bet her mom could had an unwelcome view of his crotch area.

Mr. Tanaka was all over Shelby. He clasped her hand between his, patted her arm, his fingers even snaked around her wrist on occasion, his eyes darted back and forth across her chest like a tiny tennis match is being played across the line of her cleavage. He even pulled his folding chair up close to her, and with Shelby down in the shiva chair, his position was perfect for ogling.

“I’ve been through this, Shelbs,” he said. “When I lost my wife, the community was very supportive. Hiram was wonderful. You remember, he came over and fixed the air conditioner during my shiva? All those people in the house, and the air handler crapped out."

“He knew machines,” Shelby replied.

It irritated Rachel that her mom was welcoming Mr. Tanaka's behavior. _He even called her a made-up nickname! Shelbs. Ugh._ She rolled her eyes and focused her attention elsewhere.

“Look at that,” Santana whispered. “He’s staring at her breasts, and her head is practically between his knees.”

“It’s just the angle,” Rachel replied, trying her best not to look. “These low chairs.”

Rachel could hear Mr. Tanaka continue. “If you ever need to talk, Shelbs. Day or night. Just call, and I’ll come.”

“I bet he will,” Santana muttered under her breath, clearly too amused to care.

“Thank you, Ken," Shelby replied. "I appreciate that.”

“It can be very lonely.”

“I don’t doubt it.”

Eerie silence fell over the room. Mr. Tanaka was the only guest present, and feeling that he overstayed his visit, decided it was time to leave. He reluctantly let go of Shelby's hand. “I’ll be back tomorrow to check on you.”

“Okay.”

He stood up and then pulled her up by her hand to clutch her in a full-bodied embrace. “You’re going to be fine, Shelby.”

Shelby patted his back while he held her tight.

“The old guy just copped a feel,” Puck commented, amazed at the old man's gall to do so.

Mr. Tanaka finally let go of Shelby and turned to face the children of the woman he was manhandling. “You kids take care of your beautiful mother, okay?”

“I think he had an erection,” Santana said once he’s gone.

“Oh, stop it. He did not,” their mother said. For some reason Rachel couldn't understand, she could see that her mom clearly loved the attention.

“Pushing seventy and he’s still getting it up,” Jake mused. “The man’s a keeper.”

“You’re all being horrible. You’ve known Ken forever. He’s a fine man.”

“That fine man was hitting on you,” Puck pointed out.

“He was totally hitting on you,” Santana seconded.

“He was most definitely not hitting on me,” she said, flushed with pleasure.

At this moment, Holly stuck her head in from the kitchen. “Is that horny old goat gone yet?”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Shelby defended Mr. Tanaka. “He was being compassionate.”

“Not as compassionate as he’d like, I’m sure," Holly pointed out.

“So, he’s lonely. You and I, at least, should be sympathetic,” Shelby said. “At our age, loneliness can seem so permanent.”

“Ah...look at all the lonely people,” Jake sang, oblivious to the growing tension between their mother and Holly.

“Well, he might have had the decency to wait until you were through sitting shiva before groping you like that, that’s all," Holly commented.

“He’s a tactile man. That’s just his way.”

Holly looked at Shelby, shaking her head. Rachel noticed she was close to rolling her eyes, and her mom would surely have a fit if she saw someone rolling their eyes at her. Instead, Holly retorted, "You don’t actually believe half the things you say, do you?”

“I don’t know,” Shelby replied, sitting back in her chair. “I can be pretty convincing.”

Rachel looked over to Santana who was quietly watching the whole thing with a raised eyebrow and smirk.

_What was that about?_

\-----

When the last guest was ushered to the door, everyone was too tired to eat dinner together. Apparently, all through out the evening they all got up to eat a bite or two, so they skipped a formal sit down dinner and went on to do their separate nightly routines. Santana, with Sugar's help, gave the children a bath. Jake disappeared to his room with Emma, probably to have sex. Puck went out to the store, hoping to check in before they close for the night. Shelby and Holly was busy tidying up the kitchen.

Rachel, procrastinating her return to the muggy basement, headed up to the second floor, tiptoed up the attic stairs, which creaked like a haunted house, and out the access window to the roof. She climbed up the slate until she's sitting at the highest point of the gable.

When she was a kid she used to climb up the roof to look down at the block and gather her thoughts in private. Puck would climb up here with Lauren to make out and whisper sweet nothings in each other's ears. Santana would come up to get a tan while her nails dried. Rachel didn't know if Jake ever figured out the roof. By the time he was old enough, all his siblings were all out of the house.

Knob’s End is on a high elevation, so one can see a lot from the roof. One can see into backyards for blocks, swimming pools, swing sets, barbecues, discarded toys. One can see across the rooftops to where the early morning joggers are running. One can also watch the sun come down, coloring the sky orange, red and purple. 

Rachel enjoyed the peace and quiet of the evening. A welcome break from what has been a very eventful first day of shiva. She was glad that the chaos that was her family and Mr. Tanaka kept her from thinking about Finn and her broken marriage. She was thankful that Santana was able to keep her mouth shut for an entire day. How long her silence would last was uncertain, and worried Rachel to no end.

As if on cue, the window leading to the roof opened and out came Santana. “Ha. Knew you’d be hiding out here.”

“Hello, Santana.”

She sat beside Rachel and asked, “So, what’d you think about mom and Holly?”

Rachel should’ve known Santana would not let go of the whole arguing-over-Ken-Tanaka thing that happened that afternoon between their mother and their mother’s best friend. She feigned ignorance. “What about them?”

“Oh, come on. Don’t play dumb, Rach. I know you saw what I saw.” She exclaimed, “They were having a lover’s spat before us!”

Rachel expected her sister to have crazy, oftentimes bordering on the illogical, stories—they were nothing more than rumors, really—on people but this was beyond crazy. _This was mom_ _Santana was talking about! Their recently widowed mother, for godssakes!_

In her irritation, Rachel said, “Santana, leave mom and Holly alone. They’re just friends. Stop projecting your feelings for Brittany on to them!”

Santana was visibly hurt with her last statement. She muttered, “Well, fuck you, Rachel Berry,” and went back into the house.

Rachel sighed. _So much for peace and quiet._

_One down, six more days to go._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long delay! Adult life caught up to me immediately last January. Good thing I'm slowly getting used to my new job so I was able to write a new chapter this week. Don't worry I fully intend to finish this--as it is my first multi-chapter fic. Tell me what you think about this chapter in the comments! Expect Faberry in the next chapter! :)


	3. More than what meets the eye

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Quinn Fabray makes an appearance...well, a couple of appearances.

**Chapter 2 _| More than what meets the eye_ **

Day two of shiva starts off with an early breakfast for the family. By the time the clock struck nine, everyone was fed, showered and sat still on their low chairs, ready to welcome today’s shiva callers. At breakfast, Shelby had warned their kids that the middle days of shiva—the second to the fourth—were the busiest, visitors-wise because news about a family sitting shiva has spread and people thought it was the best time to visit, not too early to be awkward or not too late to be impolite.

By two o’clock in the afternoon, the Berry children were getting tired. They’ve been at it for a few hours already, and the visitors kept coming, pouring through the door in an endless stream, as if busloads were being dropped off at the front door every half hour. Knob’s End has become a parking lot.

All four Berry children’s faces were sore from smiling politely as their mother introduced and reintroduced everyone, their asses numb from the cheap foam underneath the crappy vinyl of the shiva chair. The plastic tips of the flimsy catering chairs set up around the room scraped the oak floor as the guests jockeyed for position, gradually working their way from the back of the room to the front, where they asked the same questions as the guests who came before them, invoked the same platitudes, and squeezed Shelby’s forearm with theatrically pursed lips.

Rachel figured they should have a handout at the door to speed things along, a brief summary of their father’s illness and all that transpired in the final days, maybe even a photocopy of his charts and a four-color printout of his last CAT scan, because that seemed to be what all of his and Shelby’s peers want to talk about. And at the bottom of the handout a simple asterisked declaration would state that it’s of absolutely no interest to the grieving family where the visitor was when he/she found out Hiram Berry had died, like he was John F. Kennedy or Kurt Cobain.

Puck got by without saying much; he offered up a series of Rorschach grunts that people seem to hear as actual responses. Santana shamelessly took cell phone calls from her girlfriends back in L.A. and drank their dad’s peach schnapps she disguised as coffee in the nondescript looking tumbler she was always holding.

Jake amused himself by lying his ass off, seeing how far he can push the boundaries of credibility.

_Middle-Aged Woman: My God, Jake! The last time I saw you, you were in high school. What do you do now?_

_Jake: I run a Middle East think tank in D.C._

_Jake: I manage a private equity biotech fund._

_Jake: I’ve been coordinating a freshwater project for UNICEF in Africa._

_Jake: I’m working as a stuntman on the new Spielberg project._

It amazed Rachel to watch Jake lie his ass off and these people believe everything he said without doubting anything. She wouldn’t be surprised if they believed him if he said he was collaborating with Kanye and Taylor Swift in producing a new song.

Aside from Jake and his play-acting, one thing that also amazed Rachel were the platters. Apparently, Jews don’t send flowers, they send food, in large quantities: fruit platters, assorted cookie platters, cold cuts, casseroles, cakes, wild rice salads, bagels and smoked salmon.

Holly, who has effortlessly slipped back into her habitual role of supplemental caretaker for the Berry clan, put nonperishable items on the dining room table, along with a coffee samovar, which lead to an ad hoc buffet situation. The visitors worked their way through the chairs, chatted with the bereaved, and then gravitated into the dining room for coffee and nosh. It’s like a wake, except it’s going to last for seven days, and there’s no booze.

The visitors were mostly old people, friends and neighbors of Shelby and Hiram, coming to see and be seen, to pay their respects and contemplate their own impending mortality, their heart conditions and cancers still percolating below the surface, in livers and lungs and blood cells. Another of their number has fallen, and while they’re here to console Shelby, one can see in their staunch, pale faces the morbid thrill of having been passed over by death. They have raised their kids, paid off their mortgages, and they will spend their golden years burying each other, somberly keeping track of their relentlessly dwindling numbers over coffee and crumb cake in houses just like this one.

Rachel was chatting with Mrs. Cohen-Chang, the mother of her track and field nemesis, when Santana, who was sitting beside her, leaned over and whispered, “When are you telling mom?” Her breath reeked of peach schnapps, her cheeks were a deep shade of red.

She smiled at Mrs. Cohen-Chang and whispered through gritted teeth, “Not now, ‘Tana.”

Santana whispered back, “Oh my God will you just tell them?”

“Santana.”

“This is crazy enough that you’re keeping your divorce a secret. I mean, who does that?!”

“Quiet. Mom’s sitting next to me.”

“If you can’t tell your family then who will you tell?”

“I would willingly tell _anyone_ other than my family.”

“That’s rude.”

“Santana, why don’t you go upstairs and take a nap?”

“I can’t take this anymore. This is already a new record for me.”

“Shut up. You’re drunk on schnapps.”

“You’re stressed out and you’re grieving. You tell them or I will.”

“I will pinch you.”

“ _Tell them._ ”

“ _Fine!_ He’s gone. Finn’s gone. It’s over. It’s complicated.”

The living room fell silent when Rachel finally snapped. She stood up and was on her way to the kitchen when she turned back towards the living room, and faced a stunned crowd.

“Well, actually it’s not complicated. He’s been sleeping with my boss’ wife. I walked in on them having birthday sex on our bed! It’s not complicated. It’s simple. I’m divorcing his lying, cheating ass!”

After her outburst, no one in the crowd, even her mother, dared to speak. Rachel suddenly realized what she just did. She told everyone everything she vowed to herself not to tell her family until after the end of shiva. All because Santana couldn’t keep herself away from their father’s schnapps. She asked her older sister sarcastically, “Happy now?”

Rachel didn’t wait for her sister’s reply and walked out the door. Everyone quickly moved out of her way. She was seething because of hate (mostly for Santana) and humiliation. She was about to get into her car, when she realized she was boxed in by an unknown vehicle.

 _Great_.

Of all the times this can to happen to her, it sucked that it had to be now. While she was in the middle of a perfectly executed storm out, which would been immaculate had it ended with the sound of screeching car tires on the well-paved road.

When she looked around to see if the possibility of walking away was a good idea, she saw Holly sitting on the porch of her house across the street. She waved Rachel to come over.

Upon coming closer, she realized Holly was smoking. She didn’t know the woman smoked. She sat beside Holly and stared at her house across the street.

“Were you going somewhere? Sneaking out of shiva perhaps,” Holly joked.

“Well... It’s a long story,” she said almost sheepishly.

“I have time.” She was lighting another cigarette.

“I didn’t know you smoked.”

Holly chuckled. “There’s a lot of things you don’t know, Rachel.”

It suddenly rang a bell in Rachel’s mind. She thought back to what Santana asked her last night on the roof. _Mom and Holly?_ Had Santana unknowingly, and correctly, uncovered a story that finally had some truth in it?

“You want anything? You look like you need a drink. I have whiskey.”

“No, just a milkshake..”

“That, I don’t have.”

“No worries.” She shrugged and said, too quickly, “I guess I’ll have to run out and grab one.”

Holly chuckled again. “So you _are_ running away from your house.”

_Busted._

Holly’s smile was sweet and maternal. “Getting a little intense in there?”

“A little, yes.”

“I heard the shouting.”

It was Rachel’s turn to chuckle. “Well, that was mostly me.” She took a deep breath and said, “I just told everyone that I’m getting a divorce.”

She whistled. “Brave move.”

“Well, I didn’t want to. Until after shiva at least,” she explained, “but Santana knew and she was pressuring me to tell everyone or else she will.”

“Tough break.”

“Yeah. You know how persuasive Santana could get.” She added, “She was also drunk on dad’s schnapps.”

Holly laughed. After a beat, she asked, her tone serious, “But how are you?”

Suddenly, Rachel felt like a kid again. Talking to Holly has always made her feel like a kid, not because she looked down on her but because she could easily revert to the “Mom” tone when speaking. It used to surprised Rachel that she was more afraid of Holly’s reactions than her own mom’s. Through the years, she stopped being surprised and just welcomed Holly’s genuine concern.

Disappointing Shelby was easy, Jake did that all the time, but disappointing Holly was a different matter altogether. Rachel felt she was doing it now. Or did, really, the moment her marriage failed. “Getting by, I guess. Shiva’s a great distraction so far.”

Silence fell over them before Holly reached for her hands, put them in her own, and told her, “You’re going to be okay, Rach. I know you feel lost now, but you won’t feel this way for long.”

“How do you know?” she was suddenly inches away from a full-on crying jag. Holly diapered, fed, mothered Rachel almost as much as Shelby did, without ever being recognized for it. She realized she should have sent her Mother’s Day cards every year, should have called her every so often to see how she was doing.

_How is it that, in all these years, I never once spared so much as a thought for her?_

Rachel felt a dark wave of regret for the kind of person she turned out to be—especially towards Holly.

“You’re a romantic, Rach. You always were. And you’ll find love again, or it will come find you.” She sounded very sure, and in a world of uncertainties, a convinced, steadfast Holly was the best assurance Rachel could get.

“Did it ever find you again?”

Something changed in her expression, and she let go of Rachel’s hands.

“I’m sorry,” Rachel said. “That was a terrible thing to say.”

She nodded, accepting the apology. “It would be a terrible mistake to go through life thinking that people are the sum total of what you see.”

“I know.”

“No, you don’t,” Holly said, not unkindly. “And it’s not the time or place to go into details, but rest assured, I have not spent the last thirty years sleeping alone.”

_Is she referring to mom?_

Rachel apologized. “Of course not. I’m an asshole.”

“Maybe, but you get a free pass this week.” She offered up a friendly smirk. “Just don’t abuse it.” She looked across the street, at the crowded Berry lot. “Looks like you’re parked in by Carl Howell’s Hummer. Why a retired dentist needs to drive a tank like that in Lima, Ohio, is a question for the ages. His penis can’t be that small, can it?”

Rachel chuckled.

Holly reached into her pocket and tossed her keys to Rachel. “It’s the blue Camry. If you time it right, you can pick up Britt on your way back. I don’t like her walking home this late.”

“Thanks.”

Before Rachel stood up to leave, she reached over her to Holly for a hug. Her mother's best friend willingly put her arms around Rachel and engulfed her in the warmest hug she's had in months. It’s been forever since she had been touched, since she even had any sustained eye contact. Rachel pulled back and she could see her tears reflected in Holly's eyes.

"I don't know if I have said this before but... Thank you, you know, for all of your help, for taking care of Mom and everything.”

Holly looked startled for a second and seemed on the verge of saying something, but then looked away. "It's no big deal, Rach. You should get going."

Rachel wanted to stay and talk to Holly more, if only to notice something, _anything_ , that would gave her a hint whether Santana was correct in her observations.

\-----

Rachel parked in front of their store, _Berry’s Sporting Goods_ , and walked to Brittany’s dancing studio armed with a vegan vanilla milkshake. She saw Brittany teaching dance to a bunch of eight- and nine- year old boys and girls. She waved and minutes later, Brittany came out.

“Hi, Britt. Holly told me to pick you up.”

“Okay. I finish in 15 minutes.” She smiled. “Why don’t you go in the book store next door? They have really amazing stuff.”

With nothing better to do, Rachel nodded and walked to the bookstore aptly called _Pages_. It was fairly sized store with numerous floor to ceiling bookshelves stacked with books. It was quiet and had a homey feel.

The wind chimes hanging above the door chimed when Rachel entered, alerting the woman who was busy shelving books. When she saw who it was, Rachel couldn’t believer her eyes.

“Quinn Fabray.” She had to say it aloud to be true.

The woman looked up and smiled as soon as she saw Rachel. “Rachel Berry,” she said in a way that always made Rachel’s stomach queasy.

Quinn went to high school with and was best friends with Santana. Rachel often saw her around their house especially when she hung out with Santana and Brittany. They even called themselves _The Unholy Trinity_. Young Rachel looked up to Quinn, growing up. Although their age difference was only a couple of years, Quinn was the big sister Rachel wished she had—supportive, funny and always defended her—unlike Santana, who was her personal tormentor. Her admiration for Quinn even reached a point where Rachel considered having a nose job, with Quinn’s perfect nose as a basis. She was glad her siblings talked her out of it.

She admired Quinn because she was everything she wasn’t—blonde, beautiful, tall, smart. They had gotten close by the end of Quinn’s senior year in high school. They promised to stay in touch but time and other things got in the way. By the time Rachel was in NYADA, she had no idea what happened to Quinn aside from short, rare updates from Santana.

“I’m sorry about Hiram,” Quinn said, after a brief hug.

“Thanks.”

“Shouldn’t you be at home sitting shiva?” she asked with a smile.

Rachel never fully understood why and how she feels intimidated by Quinn. She was always reduced to a bumbling mess around her. “I needed a milkshake,” was all she could reply, raising her half-full cup.

She just nodded but didn’t say anything. “How’s Santana?”

“Same old.” _Still a blabbermouth_ , she wanted to add.

“I’ll have to make it over there one of these days.”

“You’ve got five left.”

“You’re really doing all seven days? That’s hard-core.”

“Tell me about it.”

They stared at each other, with a lot of things to say but saying nothing. Rachel wanted to ask a lot of questions, centered on what _the_ Quinn Fabray—class salutatorian and Homecoming Queen—was doing in a bookstore in Lima. It was not a bad thing per se, but people expect, Rachel included, _greater_ things from Quinn. With her smarts and talent, she expected Quinn to either be a best selling author or a successful Hollywood actress.

“How are you?” she finally had the courage to ask.

“I’m having a blast.” Quinn chuckled. “After college, I had to come back and take care of mom after the divorce. I figured I’d have to stay here so I did what everybody around here does, I started a business. Aside from this one, we have a few branches scattered around Ohio.” She paused to look at Rachel’s reaction. “I know it’s…unexpected but I’ve always been a fan of books. So…it all worked out well in the end.” 

“Are you married?” Rachel couldn’t help herself.

Quinn laughed out loud.

 _Maybe at my audacity to ask_ , Rachel thought.

The sound of the wind chimes interrupted their conversation, signaling the presence of a newcomer, who turned out to be Brittany.

“Hi Rach, I’m good to go.” She smiled at Quinn. “Hi, Quinn.”

“Hello, Britt.”

Brittany looked at them. Her face broke out into a knowing smile. She offered, “I’d just wait outside.”

_What was that about?_

Quinn looked at her with wistfulness and said, “It’s good to see you, Rachel Berry.”

“You, too,” and she was back to blubbering Rachel.

“I’ll see you around, Rach.” She added, “Feel free to come by anytime you want to sneak out of shiva.”

“I’ll hold you to that,” she replied, smiled, waved and made her way out of the store.

Once outside, the first thing Rachel did was let out a deep breath she didn’t know she was holding. Interacting with Quinn has always left her winded, for some reason.

“You okay there?” Brittany asked her out of nowhere.

“You startled me, Britt.”

“I have that effect on people. You okay to drive? You look…startled, I guess.” She added, “That wasn’t all me, right? Sorry.”

“No, it’s…” She stopped and took another deep breath.

“Quinn always has that effect on people,” she said knowingly. “On you, most especially.”

Rachel looked at Brittany. People often branded as Brittany as eccentric—or worse, stupid—but what they didn’t give her credit for was that she was intuitive. Most times, what she said in the present doesn’t make sense, but after a few years down the road, people realize she had been right all along.

“I guess I was just surprised she’s still here. Living in Lima,” she reasoned, not wanting to think about other reasons why she was so flustered with seeing Quinn.

“Why because she’s not dumb like me?”

Rachel immediately realized her mistake and said, “No, no. That’s not what I meant. I just—”

Brittany broke into a smile and said, “I was just joking. You look like you needed a joke or two.”

“Oh Britt.” With a sigh, Rachel said, “It’s hard to see people from your past when your present is so cataclysmically screwed up.”

“Welcome to my world.”

\-----

Rachel was more than elated to see upon returning that visitors were gone and shiva had ended for the day. She passed by Sebastian, who was on the porch, probably avoiding his family to get more work done. They exchanged polite nods.

She went to the kitchen and was surprised to see her mom, tidying up. She was washing a few dishes.

Rachel offered, “I’d finish up with those.”

Shelby looked up at her and smiled. “Good to see you back.”

“Yeah, I picked up Britt from the dance studio.”

Shelby was quiet for a moment, clearly gathering courage, before she looked at Rachel and said, “Rachel, honey, about Finn…”

“It’s okay, mom. I understand why you’d be surprised…mad, even…considering how hard you and dad tried to stay married and keep the family together…” Her voice started to crack. “It’s just…that life is not for everyone. I’m sorry that I wasn’t blessed with what you and dad had…but I just need you to understand that Finn and I…” She sighed, looked at her mother and said, “We’re done. We’re not getting back together after this.”

Rachel was surprised to be engulfed in her mother’s arms. She couldn’t remember the last time her mother hugged her. The suddenness of it overwhelmed her and she started to cry. And once she started, she couldn’t stop. And her mother just held her.

\-----

Rachel was washing her face at the sink, after her mother left when she finished her power cry, when Santana’s head poked out of the door and announced, “Stop moping, we’re going to _Breadsticks_.”

She was still pissed at her sister but her curiosity got the better of her so she piled in Puck’s car with all her siblings.

 _Breadsticks_ used to be a family diner, a restaurant where families celebrated won games, graduations and the like. Rachel was surprised to see it was now a bar, filled with people of varying ages on a weeknight. Puck casually mentioned that his father-in-law, who bought it a few years back, was responsible for the changes.

They found a good spot because Puck was family, the manager said. Jake ordered drinks—an assortment of shots and beer—for everyone. They were busy looking around, exchanging nods and hellos with familiar faces. Some were clearly surprised to see the Berry children out drinking on shiva night.

Santana announced, “Well, look who’s here.”

They all directed their gaze to where Santana was looking. At the bar stood Quinn Fabray with a glass of beer in hand, laughing with friends.

Rachel could feel her heart beat erratically. She hadn’t been this nervous in years.

Santana waved for Quinn to come over.

“Hello, Berrys,” Quinn said, “good to see your mom let you loose on a weeknight.”

Jake proudly replied, “We made a run for it, actually. Take a seat.”

She laughed while taking the seat beside Rachel. She raised an eyebrow at Rachel and asked, “You allowed this?”

Rachel felt her face blush.

Santana said, “Good to see you, Quinn. I’m surprised you still live here.”

Puck said, “Santana.”

“What?”

“Sometimes you’re way worse than mom,” he commented.

“That was uncalled for.”

“You should listen to yourself.”

“Well, you should _look_ at yourself.”

Quinn chuckled, familiar with Santana’s snark. Rachel smiled, too.

Santana, who was sitting across them, watched her sister’s reaction with interest. She decided to stir the pot a little. “So the thing with Finn…”

Rachel instantly knew what her sister was doing. “No, we’re not going to talk about that.”

“We won’t?” Jake asked.

Puck insisted, “But, can we?”

“We already talked about it with the whole neighborhood,” Santana said, matter-of-factly. 

“No thanks to you,” she said under her breath. Judging by the mirth in her sister’s eyes, she was clearly having fun. _Why couldn’t she just mind her own business?_

“You needed to let it out,” Santana supplied. For Quinn's benefit, she explained, "Rachel lost it earlier at shiva today and announced to the whole neighborhood she was divorcing Finn because he was sleeping around."

Quinn didn’t say a word, and just said, "Hmmm." Which was even worse for Rachel because she couldn't understand what that reaction meant. _Was she mad? Was she happy? Why would she be?_

Jake, not helping Rachel’s cause, added, “He was a tool anyway so good riddance.” He raised his shot glass and said, “To Rachel. May you have a _fulfilling_ single life ahead of you.” He added a wink for good measure.

She blushed. She clicked her glass with Quinn, who said, “To Rachel Berry.” The way Quinn said it made Rachel’s stomach churn, her cheeks blush redder and her face warm.  

Santana watched her sister’s reaction with interest. _Rachel and Quinn? The world couldn’t get any weirder than this._

\-----

When they got home, the boys went to their rooms too quickly. _Probably to have sex_ , Santana noted to herself. _Wanky_.

It was perfect because Santana wanted to talk to Rachel about Quinn. As her sister made her way to the basement, she asked, “Hey Rach you got a minute?”

Rachel looked at her quizzically but followed Santana to the porch. They sat side by side, and looked at the quiet street ahead.

“I would’ve suggested the roof but considering how tipsy we are right now and what you said last night up there, I can’t guarantee I won’t push you over.”

Rachel smiled. “Fair point.”

“So I’d get to the point because it’s late and we have an early day tomorrow…” Santana started. “So what’s with you and Quinn?”

Rachel felt her face grow hot. She tried to feign ignorance, like last night, but her sister was quick to point out, “And please don’t play dumb.”

She sighed. “Quinn’s always…Quinn, you know. To me, she’s always been...the _ideal_ … I don’t understand why but I’ve always been…drawn to her. Even in high school, when I was dating Finn and she’d come over to hang out with you I was more flustered with her around.” She exhaled. “And now that, Finn’s gone…and she’s here being…nice,” she heard Santana snort, “well, fine…she’s being her usual gorgeous self, I don’t know how to react.” Again, she sighed. “I didn’t even know I _liked_ women other than Quinn.” 

“So you do like Quinn…that way?”

Rachel blushed, caught. She retorted, “Who doesn’t?”

Santana laughed. “Good point.” After a beat she asked, “You want to know what I think?”

“I have a feeling you’ll tell me even if I say no,” she said with a smile.

“Don’t be difficult,” Santana complained.

They shared a few minutes of silence before Santana said,  “It’s gonna be Quinn Fabray.” 

Rachel raised an eyebrow at her sister. “What?”

“Quinn Fabray. She is the person you’re going to sleep with before you get back together with Finn,” she said confidently.

“What are you talking about?” Rachel blushed at the mere thought of sleeping with Quinn. “I’m not sleeping with Quinn.”

_The lady doth protest too much._

“It was poetic actually; if you think how crazy you are about her. Call it what you want, but you've always had a crush on her.  Since we were kids. Since I brought her over for the first time after school. You look at her as if the sun shone out of her ass," she added with a smirk, "and a good ass at that."

Rachel was too flustered to react properly.

“I'm not telling you to marry Quinn because that would take guts even you, or me, don't have right now," she said. "I'm just telling you that sleeping with her is inevitable. It's necessary for you to get over the fact that Finn fucked someone else. It’s simple, really.”

Rachel could not process it all properly. What her sister said made a lot of sense, on one hand, and also sounded ridiculous. Going back to Finn seemed so far-fetched right now. So she asked, "What makes you think I’m going to get back together with Finn?”

Santana took a deep breath. With all seriousness, she explained, “Starting over is complicated. It will take a lot of effort."

She said with conviction that Rachel thought Santana was referring to herself and Brittany and Sebastian. But she didn't dare ask.

“This thing with Quinn is complicated. And you don’t do complicated, Rach. You never have.”

Rachel was slightly offended with her older sister's analysis, mainly because it was true.  

Santana continued, “You have your whole life planned out since you were a kid right?”

She kept quiet.

“A good husband, a beautiful house, a great career, all the awards, everything. You got it all planned out.” She added, "And Finn's infidelity was not part of that. Quinn is not part of that. And I have a feeling that it scares you."

Rachel didn’t say anything. For the third time that day, she was near tears. The uncertainty of the future was overwhelming.

Santana stated, very sure of herself, “So you’ll sleep with Quinn. Forgive Finn and go back on the road more traveled and pretend you never got off.”

Rachel sighed. “Glad you had it all figured out.”

“I ain't your sister for nothing.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry if the chapter numbering is confusing. Blame the prologue! Lol 
> 
> Let me know what you think in the comments section!


	4. Moving along

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rachel deals with creaking floorboards, persistent mothers and Holly Holiday's motherly hugs.

**Chapter 3 | _Moving along_**

On the third day of shiva, Rachel woke up to the sound of the low groans of the floorboards above her, the rhythmic creak of the sofa bed in the den, where Jake and Emma were clearly enjoying some early morning, pre-shiva coitus. She could hear Emma's muffled voice groaning something over and over again as they gather momentum.

The first song that came to Rachel's mind was _Don't Rain on my Parade_. She started to hum it loudly to drown out the muffled cries and grunts seeping through the ceiling as she sprinted to the linoleum safety of the closet-sized bathroom.

When Rachel emerged from the bathroom, the creaking begins again. Jake was, obviously, working through some mother issues. She rolled her eyes. To forget about her brother's sexual activities, she thought of Quinn and what Santana said last night. _Could I really sleep with Quinn? Do I really want that?_

It turned out she mulled the Quinn matter too long because when she walked in the living room, everyone was already in their seats—even Jake—and a good number of guests were already around the living room.

Rachel took a deep breath and prayed for a drama-free Day 3 of shiva.

As soon as she set foot on the living room, she heard her mother call out, “Rachel!” She tried her best to slink quietly to her seat, which was beside Puck today. Every eye in the room found her. “Where were you?”

“I woke up a bit late,” she reasoned. “Sorry.”

“You remember April Rhodes?” Shelby said, as if she didn’t hear Rachel’s reply. She gestured towards a birdlike woman sitting on the chair directly in front of me.

She politely nodded. April Rhodes visited their glee club for awhile and even threatened to lure their glee coach to Broadway. She wasn’t particularly fond of the woman.

“Her son, Dan, got divorced last year,” Shelby said, quite brightly, like she’s delivering a nugget of particularly good news.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Rachel replied.

April added, “His wife was sleeping with the gardener.”

Rachel did her best not to cringe.

Shelby volunteered, “Rachel’s husband cheated on her, too.”

“ _Mother!_ ”

“What? There’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

There were about twenty other people in the room, talking to a Berry child or each other, and Rachel could feel all their heads turned to her like a stadium wave.

Shelby continued, unfazed, “April and Dan are here visiting for the summer. I thought it might be nice for the two of you to catch up.”

Not willing to have any of whatever it was her mother was throwing at her, Rachel replied, “I’m sure Dan has his own problems.” She hoped her mother could see the murder in her eyes.

“Nonsense,” April said. “I’m sure he’d love to hear from an old friend.”

Rachel was tempted to point out that this Dan guy was never a friend to her. She could barely remember him as a lanky guy who was freakishly good at math.

April and Shelby smiled conspiratorially at each other. Everyone, particularly Rachel, could hear the telepathy buzzing between them. Her husband cheated on her, his wife screwed around! It’s a match made in heaven!

“I’m not ready to start dating anytime soon,” she reasoned.

“No one said anything about dating,” Shelby said.

“That’s right,” April agreed. “Just a friendly phone call. Maybe a cup of coffee.”

They both looked at Rachel expectantly. Rachel could feel Jake’s elbow in her ribs and Puck’s low, steady chuckle.

“I’m really not looking for anything at this point. Neither coffee nor a phone call,” she said pointedly.

But April Rhodes seemed to have regained her determination, aided by Shelby’s encouragement, and insisted that Rachel give her number, which she would, in turn, pass over to Dan. _Who would want to date a guy whose mother gets women’s mobile numbers for her son?_

Rachel, who felt tired of arguing with persistent old women and still felt guilty for her yesterday’s outburst at Mrs. Cohen-Chang, acquiesced and gave her number. She only hoped Dan would be too busy, or too intimidated by her reputation, to not call.

Puck, Santana and Jake were all chuckling as they watched April Rhodes write down their sister’s mobile phone number on her little notepad.

\-----

The morning and afternoon shiva was uneventful, except for that incident with April Rhodes. The family took a break at 6PM for dinner, and the guests graciously piled out of the house.

When shiva restarted at 7PM, the house was instantaneously filled, as if the guests were just wandering outside, while the family ate dinner, and came back inside when they saw the Berry children slowly walk back into the living room.

There were around thirty or forty visitors, sitting in the plastic chairs, crammed around the buffet in the dining room, spilling over into the front hall and kitchen. The smell of perfume and instant coffee filled the air. Random fragments of conversation flew back and forth across the room like shuttlecocks. The Berry shiva was quite the scene for the over-sixty set. And the visitors kept coming, old friends and distant relatives, the new seamlessly replacing the old, walking in somber and unsure, walking out satisfied and well fed.

The Berry children saw them not as individuals, but as a single coffee-swilling, bagel-chomping, tearfully smiling mass of well-wishers and rubberneckers. They all nodded and smiled and carried on their end of the conversation in an endless loop while their minds floated somewhere outside their bodies. They were thinking about their kids (Santana), or lack of kids (Puck), about finances (most likely Jake) and ex-husbands and beautiful yet complicated blondes (Rachel, and probably Shelby), about loneliness and love and death and Hiram.

The constant crowd was like a fog on a dark road to Rachel; she needed to keep on driving for it to dissipate in her low beams.

The energy changed a little when some girls showed up to visit Jake. There were three of them, in their early twenties, and they breezed into the room in a whirling miasma of bronzed legs and bouncing asses, trailing sexuality like fairy dust as they made their way to Jake’s chair. They instantly became the center of attention, and while other conversations were still going on, these girls, as they flexed their smooth calves to go up on the tips of their high espadrilles to kiss Jake’s cheek, seemed to be followed by their own spotlight. After the kisses, the hugs, the dramatic expressions of condolence punctuated by the flipping of hair and batting of lashes, three empty chairs magically materialized in front of Jake’s shiva chair, and the girls sat down.

Rachel recognized the girls as old high school friends of Jake, all of whom he slept with repeatedly, two of whom, it was rumored, he slept with together on more than one occasion. The standout was the girl with bleach blonde hair named Kitty. To Rachel’s recollection, Jake and this girl were on and off for years.

“Oh my God, Jake,” Kitty said. She had long legs and was showing them off by wearing a skirt that reminded Rachel, and everyone who went to McKinley High, of Cheerio skirts. “I haven’t seen you since that boat party, you remember? That Russian kid with the yacht? Oh my God, we got so messed up that night.”

“I remember,” Jake said.

“I’m so sorry about your father,” another girl spoke.

“Thank you.”

“He was such a nice man,” the third one added.

“So, Jakey,” Chelsea says. “What have you been up to?”

“I’ve been doing AR work for a record label.”

“That’s so cool!”

“It’s a small, independent label, a boutique,” Jake said modestly. Rachel was willing to bet it was one of his lies. “So what have you all been up to?” What followed was ten minutes of giggles and banter, repeatedly tossed hair, and some really bad grammar. They laughed at pretty much everything Jake said, and Kitty, in particular, seemed to hang on his every word, her chair gradually inched closer until her ankles rested easily against his.

Then, Emma came back, having spent the afternoon out of the house. Rachel watched her enter the room, saw her register these hot young things surrounding her man as she made her way through the chairs to Jake’s side. “Hey, babe,” she said, smiling first at him and then at the girls. “How’s it going?”

Rachel have never heard Emma say “babe” in all the days they have been here, and it rolled clumsily off Emma’s tongue like a hasty lie.

“Great,” Jake replied. “These are some old friends of mine from high school.”

“And college,” Kitty reminded him with a smile.

“That’s right. Kitty and I were also in college together.”

“I love the name Kitty,” Emma said.

“Thanks.”

“This is Emma,” Jake said. He did not say “my fiancée,” or any other designation, and the omission landed with a resounding thud in our midst. Emma clung admirably to her gracious smile, and for the first time since the Berry’s met her, they felt bad for her. She’s a smart woman, and on some level, she has to know that this thing with Jake will never work. Still, she leaned forward to graciously shake hands and repeat each girl’s name as she’s introduced, like she’s at a business meeting. The girls flashed their whitened teeth and extended their hands, their French-manicured nails catching the light and slicing the air like razor blades.

Rachel couldn’t take it anymore. She stood up and quietly walked out of the living room. She couldn’t bear to witness how pathetic and sad the whole thing was, especially for Emma.

She was surprised to hear Holly say, “Long day, huh?” She was sitting on the porch steps, smoking yet another cigarette.

Rachel nodded and took a seat beside Holly on the porch. “Mother seemed to be intent on matching me with her friends’ sons and nephews.”

Holly chuckled. “Met anyone interesting?”

“None so far.”

After a beat, Rachel added, “I saw Quinn Fabray yesterday. She owned the bookstore beside Britt’s studio.” She cursed herself for being a blabbermouth. She was suddenly nervous that Holly, being the intuitive person she is, would catch Rachel’s flustered nature whenever the former Head Cheerio was around or mentioned, lately.

“How is she?”

“She still looks the same… I mean, blonde…” She was about to say “pretty” but caught herself just before she uttered the word. Rachel hated herself for being a babbling, blushing teenager.

“One can reasonably expect that, given her previous hair color,” Holly teased her. “Will she be visiting for shiva anytime soon?”

Rachel nodded shyly. “Yes, she said she’d come by one of these days.”

“Were you friends in high school? I recalled she used to rule that high school of yours.”

“Not at the start,” she explained, “but towards the end, we kind of...bonded.”

“Mutual hatred of Sue Sylvester could do that to people,” she said, followed by a laugh.

Rachel chuckled in agreement. She loved hearing Holly’s laugh. It sounded genuine, heartfelt. As if on cue, Holly reached over, wrapped an arm around her shoulder and pulled Rachel close. She whispered, “Laughing can be therapeutic.”

She could only nod.

“Do you miss your Dad?”

“Yeah,” Rachel got misty-eyed. “I missed him when he was alive.”

“He loved you guys and your mom so much.”

Again, not knowing the proper thing to say, Rachel just nodded.

“Everything’s going to be okay, sweet cheeks,” Holly whispered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry if I took too long to update AND if this feels like a filler chapter, because it is. Haha I just had to get that Jake/Emma/Kitty thing out of the way. Rest assured, the chapters will be longer and would be more Faberry-centric from here on out!


	5. Anything can happen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally, some Faberry action!

**Chapter 4 | _Anything can happen_**

Breakfast was served. On platters, of course. The pastries and bagels continued to arrive every day, courtesy of Shelby and Hiram’s friends and set out by Holly, who quietly lets herself in every morning to see to things. Brittany was also present, sipping thoughtfully at her coffee, sneaking glances at Santana over the rim of her mug. Sebastian, as always, was oblivious to what’s happening around him. Jake and Emma seemed extra sweet this morning, as if the ghosts of his ex-girlfriends didn't haunt them. Puck and Sugar were their usual wholesome selves.

Rachel was still on the fence which Puck she liked better—the horn-dog from high school or the quiet and brooding husband of today.

The quiet breakfast they were sharing was disrupted when Jake said, out of the blue, “Everyone,” he cleared his throat for effect, “lately I’ve been thinking and I’ve decided that I’d like to join the company.”

At first, stunned silence filled the room. Emma looked at Jake, proud and knowing. Brittany stopped sneaking glances at Santana. Even Sebastian put his phone down and paid attention. Santana looked at Rachel, her eyes widening with glee. Her smile said, This is about to get good.

“What are you talking about?” Puck calmly asked.

Jake wiped his mouth and cleared his throat again. “I talked to Dad about it a little while back. It’s something he built for us, something he wanted to pass on. It’s his legacy to us, and I’d like to be a part of it.”

“Okay.” Puck nodded and put down his coffee mug. “And what is it you’d like to do for the company, Jake?”

Rachel could sense the tension growing.

“I want to help you grow it.”

“The only thing you’ve ever grown was hemp.”

“And I made a profit.”

“Not nearly as much as we spent on your lawyers when you got busted.”

“Listen, Puck. You don’t believe in me. I get that. I never believed in myself either, really. But people can change. I’ve changed. And we complement each other. You’re the brains of the operation, I know that. But what about advertising and promotion? What about personnel and PR? I’m a people person, Puck. That’s who I am. And you’re...not one. You’re a good guy, but you’re a hard-ass and, let’s face it, you’re a little scary. You’re actually scaring me right now. Your face looks very red. Are you even breathing? Is he breathing?” He looked at everyone at the table for confirmation.

Puck brought his hand down on the table. Hard. “This is my life!” he shouted.

It was the first time in Rachel’s life that she’d seen her older brother this angry. He never passionately reacted to anything since he came back from his brief duty in Afghanistan. Or since his high school girlfriend died.

She genuinely feared for Jake’s life.

“I have given the last ten years of my life to this company! I’ve stayed here and helped Dad expand it while all of you went away to follow your dreams and lived the lives you wanted! I’m sorry, Jake, but I just can’t afford to be the next stop on your tour of professional self-destruction.” Puck was clearly livid with rage. The veins on his neck was threatening to pop open any minute.

Rachel wished Jake would stop. But he didn’t. He continued, “I understand why you’d say that, I do. But this is a family business, Puck. And I’m in the lucky sperm club, same as you.”

Puck got up and shoved his chair back. “We’re not having this conversation.” He walked away, limping. Sugar instantly stood up as soon as the door closed, politely apologized for her husband’s behavior, and went after him.

\-----

Despite the morning drama, and true to one of the lessons discussed in Shelby's book, the show must go on.

Promptly at 9AM, all Berry children, except for Puck, was back in their shiva chairs. Sugar was also noticeably absent. Rachel guessed she was probably trying her best to convince her husband that murdering his younger brother wasn’t going to do him any good, despite how liberating it would feel.

Shelby and her three children faced the crowd like a rock band on tour, same set list, different town. They performed their sad little shiva smiles on cue and repeated the same inane conversations over and over again.

“He just slipped away,” Shelby said, when asked about Puck.

“Two kids now,” Santana said, when asked about her family life.

“I’m a photojournalist. I just got back from a year in Iraq, embedded with a marine unit,” Jake said, when asked about what he does for a living.

“We’re separated,” Rachel said, when asked where Finn was. Every half hour or so, someone would ask where Finn was, and she would say that they are separated. Then, like a game of telephone, word would quietly spread through the room, so that everyone present would know not to ask. And then, invariably, new visitors would arrive, and someone uninformed would ask Rachel again, and the cycle will repeat. Rachel felt bad for the ones who ask, who bear the awkwardness for the rest of the crowd.

The matchmaking also continued but today the guys being matched were present, standing or sitting somewhere around the house, waiting for their turn to talk to Rachel. It was a sad version of a 90s dating game show. Santana loved every minute of it as much as Rachel hated it.

Shelby’s friends brought their sons and nephews. Millie Anderson brought her son, Blaine, who is thirty-one, unmarried and cute. Millie positioned her son right in front of Rachel and made painfully obvious attempts at engaging Rachel and Blaine in conversation. What pretty much every person in Lima, Ohio except Millie knew was that Rachel was not Blaine’s type. Women were not his type.

Aside from the stream of forgettable sons, nephews and grandsons that Shelby insisted that Rachel meet, morning shiva was pretty much uneventful. Similar to the previous day. Puck and Sugar continued to be absent from the house. Rachel, in a way, envied them. She was bored of the conversations with men she didn’t find amusing in any way, and tired of smiling at near-strangers. It was similar to acting but with a smaller audience, with double the effort and with no compensation—monetary or otherwise.

The day and Rachel’s mood turned for the better when Quinn Fabray entered the Berry home. Her short hair had that messy uncombed look but, to Rachel, it made her more beautiful. She smiled at everyone who looked at her—polite, charming, but not too happy. She looked perfect, especially to a certain brunette Broadway actress. Rachel realized she was staring—near ogling—Quinn so she focused her attention back to Ted, a calligraphy-obsessed architect, who was the son of a friend of a friend. She still sneaked glances at Quinn once in a while.

Quinn went straight to Shelby. They exchanged hugs, smiles and a few words before Quinn went over to Santana. All this time, Rachel was painfully aware of Quinn’s presence. She wondered why Quinn didn't directly talk to her. _I am the reason she’s here, after all!_

A voice in Rachel’s head added, _How can you be so sure?_

To Rachel’s relief, Quinn switched chairs, from the one in front of Santana to one in front of Rachel, as soon as Ted stood up and said goodbye.

She said, “I've never paid a shiva call before.”

“You're doing great.”

Quinn raised an eyebrow at her.

“I meant you did okay with Santana and mom minutes ago.”

Quinn switched topics. “You never came by the store?”

“Sorry, shiva duties.”

“Speaking of, it looks like you need to stretch those long legs. Why don't you give me a tour of the Berry home? I haven’t been here in awhile.”

Rachel couldn’t help but blush at the passing compliment.

They made their way outside. Rachel started the tour from the front porch, then moved to the backyard and stopped at the pool. Quinn readily removed her shoes and dipped her feet up to mid-calf, in the water. She encouraged Rachel to do the same.

Rachel was about to dip her feet in the water when she slipped. She recovered just in time to avoid any blood, bruise or broken bone. Thanks to Quinn’s quick reflexes.

“You really are a mess, aren’t you,” she teased.

Rachel sighed. “Well, you’re certainly not catching me at my best.”

After a beat, Quinn asked, “Do you miss him?”

At first Rachel wondered if she was asking about Finn, but just one look at Quinn’s eyes confirmed that she was asking about Hiram.

“Do I miss my dad? Yes, I do miss him. Very much. And he did happen to die at a time when life was kinda messy. I mean, I don’t know if I would’ve talked to him about it, had he been alive. But,” she sighed, “there’s something nice about knowing that he’s out there.”

Quinn sighed, too. “Yeah.”

They shared a quiet, companionable silence. A few minutes later, Rachel chuckled, remembering a fond memory. “Quinn, have you ever been to Maine?”

She chuckled and looked quizzically at the brunette.

She instantly felt shy. “Please just go with it.”

“Hmm…I’ve been to Cape Cod. Does that count?”

“It does.” Rachel sighed and looked at the water. “Whenever I drive on the Interstate, I always thought that if I keep heading north I would get to Maine, right? It doesn't have to be Maine specifically. Just any place new.”

Quinn nodded.

“And I never have. I’ve _never_ taken any chances.” She took a deep breath and looked at Quinn’s eyes, “I’ve spent my entire life playing it safe just to avoid being exactly where I am right now.”

The reality of her failed marriage, something that Rachel refused to confront since she moved out, caught up to her, as she sat with Quinn in the quiet and serene backyard, with a number of single forgettable men inside the Berry house, waiting for their turn to talk to Rachel. It seemed pathetic to Rachel. Society’s view that she needed a man, or anyone for that matter, to recover from Finn’s betrayal. As if being (soon-to-be-) divorced at thirty three was the worst thing that could happen to her.

Quinn sensed Rachel’s quiet despair. “Where you are right now? In a nice backyard, with sun on your skin, water between your toes…” She added with a mischievous smile, “and a hot girl sitting beside you.”

Rachel smiled.

“Cut yourself some slack, Rach. Anything can happen, anything happens all the time.”

As if on cue, Quinn leaned towards Rachel and pressed their lips together for three brief seconds. Rachel knew, she counted. It was both the shortest and longest three seconds of Rachel’s life.

Quinn was smiling as she leaned away. “Just to give you something other than your ex to think about while you sit all day,” she explained.

Rachel wanted to adamantly clarify that she doesn’t sit around all day, but realized that wasn't the point.

_Quinn Fabray kissed me._

Quinn stood up, leaned towards Rachel and playfully closed her jaw which literally gaped open in shock. She checked Rachel’s lips for any stray lipstick, and, finding none, walked away chuckling, clearly amused at the brunette’s stunned reaction.

Rachel was still seated by the pool, her leg still up to the knees in the water when Holly came out from the house and said, "Your mother is looking for you, Rach. Your uncle Stan is here and your mom wants all of you back on your little chairs."

 


	6. Early morning life choices

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rachel is confronted with the need to make life altering decisions on an early morning. Good thing she was a morning person.

**Chapter 5 | _Early morning life choices_**

Rachel woke up feeling refreshed. She owed part of it to her first good night sleep since she moved out of her marital home, and most of it to Quinn. For that amazing three-second kiss.

Rachel replayed what happened yesterday in the pool, over and over again. There was no scenario possible that would point to the conclusion that Quinn didn’t like her. Because she clearly did. What Rachel spent most of her time on was thinking about the extent of Quinn’s admiration. Was it serious? Or was she just being generous—kind, even—to Rachel who was seconds away from breaking down yesterday afternoon?

Her reverie was interrupted by Shelby who appeared beside her bed, out of nowhere, having skillfully avoided the creaking floorboards, and said, “Rach, honey, Finn’s here.”

_Perfect timing._

\-----

“What else could you possibly tell me?” Rachel quipped back at Finn when he said he wanted to talk to her in private.

They were in the Berry’s backyard, away from the pool, to Rachel’s relief.

“Oh god, you're not getting married are you?” she exclaimed.

Finn announced, “Jen is pregnant. The kid is mine.”

Rachel’s world, as soon as righted it feels after that Quinn Fabray kiss, came crashing down again, at this development. By now, she was truly convinced of the unfairness of this world. It was Finn who cheated, yet it was Finn’s dreams—he wanted to be a father since Day 1 of his marriage to Rachel—which were being fulfilled. To Rachel, it seemed that he was getting rewarded by the universe for leaving her, for turning his back on the union he willingly entered six-almost-seven years ago.

Rachel looked at him. He was obviously happy with the news, and was trying his best not to look overly delighted for her benefit.

He continued, “I intend to be there for her. Be a father to our baby. But I feel that before I can do that, I have to…make amends with you. I…I acknowledge that what I did was unfair to you…so I want to apologize. I’m sorry, Rachel.”

Rachel was convinced of the genuineness of Finn’s apology but she couldn’t fully let go of the anger for Finn, for Jen and for whoever deity’s idea it was that she needed to go through this humiliating experience once in her life.

To add insult to the injury, Finn pushed an envelope across the table, towards Rachel. “These are the papers your lawyer sent. I’ve signed them all.”

“That quick, huh,” she retorted. Her anger slowly rising to the surface.

“Rach, please. Let’s not do this.”

“What?” she asked, pissed. “Just because you’re having a kid with your _mistress_ doesn’t mean I don’t have the right to be angry!”

As Rachel stormed out on Finn, carrying the goddamned divorce papers, she met Jake at the front porch, who was also on his way out.

He offered, “I’m going out for a drive. Wanna come?”

She shrugged. “Sure.”

\-----

Jake stopped in front of an unfamiliar house, on a quiet street, somewhere in Lima Heights.

“Jake—”

“Quinn Fabray’s house,” he said, as if to explain everything,

“Oh.”

“Go on, sis,” he challenged Rachel with a smirk, “explore the unknown.”

Rachel was bewildered. Where did her brother got the idea that something was happening between her and Quinn? Was she too obvious? Did he talk to Quinn?

“I have eyes, Rach,” he said, as if he could read her mind.

She reluctantly got out of the car.

“See you in an hour. Tell Quinn I said hi!” Jake said as he sped away, the noise of his screeching tires disturbing the quiet neighborhood. Quinn included.

Rachel saw Quinn emerge from her house, to check what the noise was about. She was wearing an oversized McKinley High hoodie, pajamas and cat slippers. “Rach?”

 _She looked cute,_ was Rachel’s first thought. _Cute?! Oh my god. What’s wrong with me?_ She felt like an infatuated teenager.

“Hi Quinn,” she replied, walking towards her.

“Was that your brother? What are you doing here this early?”

“Yeah. Jake dropped me off.” She added, “He said he’s coming back to pick me up after an hour.”

“Aren’t you supposed to do shiva today?” she asked, looking at Rachel, trying to sense if anything was wrong.

“Yes. We…uh,” she hesitated. “We just needed some time away from the house.”

Quinn seemed to accept the excuse and invited Rachel inside her house. It was quiet, a little quaint but it felt warm. Lived in. There were pictures, paintings and various trinkets hanging around. It was clean except for a few discarded pieces of clothing that missed the hamper. 

Quinn handed Rachel a cup of coffee. “Sorry for the mess.”

“It’s okay.”

“What do you have there?” she asked, referring to the envelope Rachel laid on the table.

She hesitated again. “Divorce papers.”

Quinn just nodded.

“Finn brought them over. This morning,” she said.

Quinn raised an eyebrow sexily. “He’s a morning person, I see.”

Rachel chuckled. “Not really. Just too excited, I guess.”

Her brows furrowed in confusion, as if the idea of being eager to divorce Rachel Berry appalled her. Maybe it did.

“He’s having a baby.” To emphasize, she added, “With the same woman he cheated on me with.”

She cringed. “And I'm guessing you stormed out on him?”

Rachel sheepishly smiled. Quinn really did know her. “I did. Not because I didn't want him to be a dad or have a good thing with Jen. Because I'm over him, honestly. It just...feels unfair!  _Why is the universe being kind to him when it was him who cheated?!_ ” she ranted. “Why not give me, the aggrieved person in all of this, the happy ending?”

She looked like she was seconds away from an emotional breakdown. Quinn put down her mug, moved closer to Rachel and hugged her.

Rachel’s eyes instantly closed upon contact with Quinn. Her arms quickly, as if they had a mind of their own, wrapped around Quinn’s waist. And she cried. Quiet yet heart-wrenching sobs.

After a few minutes of Rachel crying and Quinn rubbing her back, telling her “it’s okay,” Rachel nuzzled Quinn’s neck. She felt the blonde jerk in surprise but didn’t pull away. She took it as a good sign and continued to make her way to Quinn’s lips. When her lips were near Quinn’s, she felt the blonde pull away, but their arms and lower half of their bodies were still touching.

Rachel was near tears.  _Why do the people she liked end up liking people other than her?_

“Rach,” Quinn said, in a warm but firm voice. She looked at Rachel’s eyes. “We’re not having our first real kiss just because you’re pissed at how well your ex’s life turned out after…everything.”

The brunette backtracked. _What does that mean? Does she like me? Does this mean we’ll have the kiss in the future? Not just now?_

Quinn, knowing Rachel fully well, was sure that the brunette diva was having conversations in her head. “I really want to kiss you. And more. I just think that today, this moment, is not the right time. I want you to be really sure, when we do it, that you’re doing it for the right reasons. Not just because you want to get back at your ex.”

Rachel sighed. It was frustrating. But she was happy that whatever it was she was feeling, Quinn felt it, too.

She rested her forehead against Quinn’s collarbones. To avoid Quinn’s intense stare.

“Rach.”

“Yeah.”

“Look at me.”

She looked up and stared into the blonde’s hazel eyes.

“You know what’s the best part about kisses?”

Rachel groaned. She was convinced that Quinn was trying to kill her.

“The best part of any first-kiss is the lead-up to it, the moment right before the lips touch. It's like a big drumroll.” Quinn looked at Rachel with a smile and asked, “So, how about, today, we just stick with the drumroll.”

“Can I make one counter argument?”

Quinn laughed. “Go ahead. Just one.”

“But we already had our first kiss. By the pool.”

She answered with a knowing smile, “That wasn’t a kiss. And when we do kiss, you’d know the big difference.”

Rachel couldn’t help but blush. “So drumroll, huh.”

“Yep.” She clarified, “But we’re not going to kiss.”

They leaned towards each other. Their faces only inches apart. Rachel has to agree that it felt special, magical even, just looking into Quinn’s eyes, smiling at her.

The magic ended by the sound of an obnoxiously loud car horn.

Rachel whispered, “I hate my brother. And the drumroll.”

The sound of Quinn’s laugh warmed Rachel’s heart.

\-----

“Sorry I’m late.”

“Your shirt’s on inside-out,” she pointed out, hoping he’d correct it before Emma or their mother would see it.

But Jake only replied, “That I did not know.”

They drove back to the house in silence. Brooding about their life choices that morning, and hoping that the house would be quieter than when they left. Rachel was hoping Finn was gone. She wasn’t quite ready to deal with him yet.

Jake was hoping Emma wouldn’t sense his infidelity in any way. He told his sister, “If we didn’t live on a dead end, I’d probably just keep on driving.”

“I know the feeling, little brother. But your problems will just follow you.”

“Speaking of problems.” Jake nodded at the front porch, where Santana was sitting, smoking.

They got out of the car and sat on the porch, each on Santana's side. She explained, “Sebastian just left to attend an important presscon in Los Angeles. A big-shot player will announce he is retiring from basketball.”

“Why do you look so pissed you don't even care if he's here!” Jake wisely pointed out.

“Stop being a smart-ass,” Santana reprimanded her youngest brother.

Rachel was about to speak when they heard their mother's voice from behind them. “What are you doing there? Your chairs are waiting!”

They collectively groaned like 5-year-olds being forced to take naps in the afternoon, and make their way back to the living room.

So much has happened already and Day 5 of shiva was just about to start. Rachel looked up to the sky and whispered, _Help us survive another day, Dad._

\-----

To Rachel’s relief, Puck was back on his chair albeit with a permanent scowl. He looked a lot like a petulant child who was forced to sit through a boring dinner with old people. Santana, still affected by Sebastian’s exodus to L.A., also had a scowl on her face and a mug of her dad’s schnapps in her hands. Jake was also uncharacteristically quiet. Rachel guessed her brother felt guilty for what he did that morning that resulted in an inside-out shirt.

Rachel remembered what happened to her morning and that drumroll moment with Quinn.

_I really want to kiss you. And more._

She blushed at the memory of Quinn’s words. She wasn’t sure what it was she was doing with Quinn, or where it would lead, or why she was doing it. But she was sure of one thing: it felt great. And she hadn’t felt this great in awhile.

Her musing was interrupted by Day 5’s Inappropriately Self-Absorbed Shiva Caller, Sandy Ryerson. Her sixth grade voice coach. He had a balding head and a fondness for argyle clothing, khaki pants and knitted sweaters. He still looked the same as he did when he taught Rachel decades ago.

Santana leaned towards Rachel and whispered, “So he’s the reason why you loved argyle and knitted sweaters.”

Rachel rolled her eyes. “Ha ha.”

Sandy asked Rachel how her Broadway career was going ("Very well, thank you. But I am on a break right now.") and boasted to everyone who was in attendance that he made Rachel Berry the performer she was today.

Santana wanted to point out that Rachel was probably dancing and singing in their mother’s womb, but decided not to save her sister from her misery.

As if Sandy Ryerson was not enough to torment Rachel, Shelby’s team of matchmakers were also in attendance.

Maybe it was because more time has elapsed since the funeral and people were less worried about the appropriateness of it all, or because there were apparently a lot of single men out there, or because Shelby has clearly put the word out, or because Rachel was sitting in their living room on display for all to see, or because there seemed to be a premium placed on a divorced woman without kids who can fend for herself, or because some women of a certain age seemed to think it’s their God-given right to act as brokers in affairs of the heart, but regardless of the reason, the matchmakers were out in full force today.

Santana was willing to bet the fact that it was the second to the last day of shiva was also one of the reasons. Their days were numbered, and they were hungry for a matchmaking victory.

Rachel wondered what organization certified matchmakers, what the criteria were, and, more immediately, how a sixty something woman who wears leopard-print spandex pants and bubblegum-pink lipstick to a Sunday-afternoon shiva call can possibly expect to be taken seriously as an arbiter of good taste. She had to, repeatedly, restrain herself from rolling her eyes too hard.

As Rachel tuned out another mother-son tandem who was convincing her that a forty year old man still living with his parents was a catch, Santana leaned in and teased, “Should I tell mom to switch tactics and recommend single women instead?”

Rachel blushed. She spoke to Santana through gritted teeth, “Shut up, 'Tana.”

Santana chuckled. To the mother-son tandem’s surprise.

Santana and schnapps was apparently a deadly combo. But Rachel recognized that her sister raised a very valid point. What would their mother think? Would she be okay that one of her children was (suddenly) gay? Would she ( _god forbid_ , thought Rachel) publish a new book to mark this development in their family?

Just like that, the magic of the moment she shared with Quinn that morning was eclipsed by Rachel’s tendency to overthink, to worry about things before they even happen.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm on a roll today! :) I hope the plot won't feel hurried to you in any way. Let me know what you think in the comments! 
> 
> PS: The drumroll reference was from How I Met Your Mother.


	7. Love causes cancer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After an almost two-year hiatus, I'm back! 
> 
> I put in some Faberry action for you as an apology for putting you through the very long wait.

**Chapter 6 | _Love causes cancer_**

Rachel woke up strangely energized, her stomach growling. The overstocked fridge offered her its bounty of sympathy food. She got a hummus dip and pita bread, and then headed up to the roof—her second favorite spot in their house next to her soundproofed bedroom.

Since Knob’s End was on a high elevation, her spot on the roof provided a great view that extended up to three blocks away. It was a perfect spot to watch the sunrise and, apparently, Holly _and_ Santana do the walk of shame to their respective houses.

Holly was the first to do The Walk, as she made her way back to her humble abode across the street from the Berry residence. Her back was facing Rachel so she didn’t see her observer on the rooftop. Rachel couldn’t think of a logical reason why Holly would sleep at the Berry house when her own bed was conveniently less than a kilometer away, other than the fact that Shelby wanted her to, or Holly wanted to, for Shelby.

_Was Santana, for once in her life, correct in her assumptions?_

While Rachel was contemplating the possibility that her mother might be in a relationship with Holly, she saw her sister come out of the very same house Holly entered a few minutes ago.

_Who knew sleepovers were still a thing these days?_

Since Santana was facing the Berry residence, it was easy for her to spot Rachel, who was waving to her as if they were in a busy airport. Rachel gestured for her to come up the roof. The older Berry rolled her eyes at the theatrics.

Minutes later, the access window opened, bearing a tired Santana.

“Good morning, Santana,” in her best mom voice.

Her sister rolled her eyes. “Don’t look at me like I’m Finn, Rach. Because I’m not.”

Rachel looked down guiltily.

“This is different from your thing with Finn. This is different. I love Britt. You know that.”

“What about Sebastian?”

“I would never love Sebastian, or anyone for that matter, the way I love Britt,” she explained wistfully. “I wouldn't do that to her.” Her voice cracked. Tears started to well up in her eyes.

Rachel asked, “What _did_ happen between you two?”

Santana remained silent. She looked like she wanted to say something, everything, but couldn’t. Didn’t. She just let the stillness of the morning—the sounds of birds chirping, leaves crackling in the slight wind—do the talking.

Rachel accepted the fact that her sister preferred to keep this to herself. One of the rare times. So she let it be. “So what will you do now? Leave Sebastian?”

Santana wiped her tears before they even fell. “Don't be dumb, Rach. We're grownups now. I'm a mom. So I have to think like one. Sebastian and the boys are my family.” Santana said it with conviction, as if her decision made complete sense.

Maybe it did to her but not to Rachel, who still believed in happy endings and marrying for love although she has long ago given up on trying to understand the logic behind her sister’s life decisions.

“Is it the whole word or is it just this family?” Santana wondered aloud. “Me and Sebastian. You and Finn. Jake and Emma, Puck and Sugar. No one is happy.” She sighed. “Everyone’s angry, lying, cheating. Just show me one happy adult…”

Apropos to nothing, Rachel said, “I saw Holly come out of our house before you came out of theirs.”

Santana shrugged. “At least she and mom are happy.”

“Do you really think there’s something there?” she asked with all seriousness.

“Honest answer, yes. And please don’t ask me to explain why.”

She kept quiet. _Mom, huh._ She heard Santana ask, “Were you surprised?”

Rachel remembered the past two months of her life. First, there was Finn and Jen. Then, Dad. Then, Quinn. The kiss, the drumroll, everything. Now, Holly and Shelby. If anything, the past months have taught her to start expecting the unexpected and be ready for all kinds of outcomes. “The single advantage of being me these days is that it’s very hard to surprise me. So, no.”

They sat in companionable silence.

Rachel mused, “Three months ago I was happy. I had a nice apartment, a good job. I was in love with my husband—”

“No.”

“What do you mean ‘No’?”

“He was sleeping around for a _year_ and you didn’t notice,” Santana pointed out. “How _in love_ could you have been?”

Her sister did make sense. “Fair point,” she conceded. “But I still hope I can do that though. With someone. Find someone and fall in love. And have it _last_.” She sighed. “But it all seems impossible to me right now.”

“Love causes cancer. Like anything else.” Santana looked at the house across the street—particularly Britt’s window—and added wistfully, “But it’s still love. It has its moments.”

Rachel found herself agreeing with her sister. With her recent failure of her marriage, one could expect that she would stop believing in the magic and the power of love. But she didn’t. Maybe Holly was really right all along and Rachel _is_ a romantic.  Her marriage with Finn might not have been ideal but she couldn’t deny the fact that she and Finn did truly love each other at one point in their lives. And when they were in love, they were blissfully happy.

Naturally, thinking of Finn made her think of Quinn, as she is wont to do recently. “Speaking of moments, I had a moment with Quinn the other day.”

Santana whistled. “This day just keeps on getting better.” She chuckled. “Who knew my little sister could land McKinley’s Queen Bee, Quinn Fabray?”

“Starting to do complicated,” Rachel said, feeling proud.

Being the pervert and big gossip that she was, she asked, “How does it feel? Sleeping with _the_ Quinn Fabray.” She immediately noticed her sister’s brief hesitation. She shook her head in disbelief. “You do know that for it to count as a rebound, one must _sleep_ with another.”

“It’s not—” she tried to correct her sister.

Santana interrupted her. “What _did_ you do?”

“We kissed.”

“Lame,” Santana snorted. “I know you want to sleep with her. Everybody who is in their right mind, does. So what’s stopping you?”

“At first, it was her idea. To not rush into things,” she replied truthfully. “But, in hindsight I realize she is correct. With everything that’s happening—Dad, Finn being a dad, Quinn, mom and Holly—I think it would be best if I…don’t rush into a relationship immediately.”

Santana joked, “Who said anything about a relationship? You just have to scratch that itch and be done with it.”

Rachel nearly punched her sister in the arm—her reaction whenever her brothers said something obnoxious or sleazy. She glared at her sister. “You know it’s not like that with Quinn and I.”

Santana snorted. “Yeah, right. How could I forget how badly you pined for her when you were a nerdy kid.”

“I did not,” she scoffed, like a petulant child. “And I hate you.”

\-----

When Rachel and Santana went down from the roof, the house slowly woke up, with Holly leading the charge. Santana threw Rachel knowing looks at the sight of Holly—freshly showered, back from next door, as if she slept there all along—and Rachel wanted to strangle her sister for being so obvious.

Rachel sat primly by the table and watched Holly do her thing—setting out food platters on the table, urging everyone to eat quickly and to shower as soon as they finished eating. She was amazed at the woman’s efficiency and dedication to helping their family.

 _Mom, most especially_ , Rachel thought _._

In between hustling everyone out of bed, into the table and back to their rooms to prepare, Rachel saw Holly give her mom warm smiles and brief touches on the hand, shoulder or arm. Santana called it _Totally Gratuitous Touching_. How her sister comes up with these names continue to baffle Rachel.

Once or twice, Shelby or Holly caught her looking. She quickly looked away, feeling guilty for staring.

\-----

Everyone expected a busy day ahead as this was the last full day of shiva, according to the informational pamphlet Rabbi Jacob left on the piano. Tomorrow was a Saturday and the mourners were expected to go up to the synagogue to perform a ritual and take the rest of the day off. On Sunday, Rabbi Jacob would come and lead the family in a small closing ceremony and snuff out the shiva candle.

With five days of shiva done, one would expect everyone that wanted to visit, have. Apparently not. The shiva calls started bright and early, people wanting to get their obligations over with in time to enjoy one of the last warm days of the season. The guests sat like they’ve got all the time in the world while their golf clubs, tennis rackets, and swimsuits lie waiting for them in the trunks of their cars.

Rabbi Jacob showed up with a group of Puck’s old buddies, all ex-jocks. It was a sad sight to see that, after all these years, Jacob still hung around the jocks, patiently waiting for his turn to be considered as one of their own. They talked about the recent Panthers and Broncos game, while their wives sat quietly beside them with looks of bored indulgence. Better baseball than mistresses and hookers, their expressions said.

Jacob was in jeans, a t-shirt, and flip-flops, every inch the cool rabbi off duty. His wife, Emily, was pretty and quiet, with nervous eyes and a flickering smile that never quite achieved ignition. The other guys had this running joke of apologizing to him every time they swore or said something off-color, which was pretty much every other minute.

Rachel had to stop being sad for Jacob when Mercedes and Kurt visited because their presence demanded her full attention as always. They spent about ten minutes discussing Hiram and his illness and death. Then, their conversation immediately moved to the duo’s favorite topic: people they went to high school with.

_Tina Cohen-Chang is divorced and drives a Ferrari._

_Sam Evans is gay, to the surprise of absolutely no one._

_Mike Chang owns a string of bowling alleys._

_Artie Abrams is running for state senator._

_Marley Rose is busy saving the world as part of_ Doctors Without Borders.

_Joe Hart’s house burned down, but they all got out._

_Ryder Lynn was arrested for having kiddie porn on his office computer._

_Rachel Berry left her husband and is busy sharing three-second kisses with Quinn Fabray._

As a one-line update, Rachel felt she fitted in quite nicely, better than she actually did fit back in the day.

It was also a day of reunion for Santana whose friends—mostly former Cheerios—visited almost the same time as Puck’s and Rachel’s visitors. It felt like an impromptu McKinley High Homecoming Party but with fruit platters, fogged up mirrors and a big ass candle in the living room. 

Santana hid her diamond rings and sat up straighter. She trotted out her boys for a command performance of cuteness. Cole sulked, but Andrew obliged, letting the women lift him up, pointing out their ears and eyes. Cole picked his nose and wiped it on his shorts. Everyone cooed. Snapshots of children were passed around and exclaimed over. Everyone is adorable. Everyone is perfect. No one present has ever produced an ugly or even ordinary baby. The women looked each other over as they chat, measuring thighs, bellies, hips, and asses, taking into account body types and recent pregnancies. They silently evaluated and passed judgment, realigning themselves in the pecking order.

Watching them, Rachel couldn’t decide which was a better choice—be like Sugar and join her husband while he chatted with friends and pretend that she was having the best time of her life, or be like Santana and secretly compete with these women in terms of the husbands they married, the children they had, the houses they lived in, the perfect figure they kept and the cars they drove.

Someone procured an old yearbook and all Santana’s friends shrieked like hyenas.

Kurt rolled his eyes at the noise. He continued his tirade about the clothes he designed and made. Rachel tuned him out.

It was only when she heard Kurt ask, “Have you seen Quinn Fabray? Wasn’t she a Head Cheerio? Shouldn’t she be here with _them_?” that Rachel’s attention refocused on her guests. 

Rachel felt herself blush uncontrollably at the mention of Quinn. “She was here yesterday.”

Mercedes nodded knowingly. “She was always a different kind of Cheerio. The bookish type.” She added, “Probably the only one to exist in the history of McKinley. _Ever_.”

Kurt asked, “How is she? I heard she stayed behind to take care of her mom.”

“She’s okay,” Rachel replied. “She owns the bookstore beside the studio where Britt teaches.”

“How does she look?” he asked.

Rachel wanted to say, “Still pretty,” but settled on “Still the same.”

“And by ‘the same’ I take it you mean she still looks perfect—shiny blonde hair, fair skin, pretty face,” he said with admiration. He has always been a fan of the blonde.

“Husband? Kids?” Kurt continued.

Mercedes replied, “None that I know of.” She looked at Rachel, who was blushing at the mere mention of Quinn, like a giggly school girl, and said, “You two should catch up.”

This rang the warning bells in Rachel’s mind. _Why would Mercedes suggest such a thing? What does she know?_ She replied, “We did. When she visited,” trying her best to remain as neutral as she could to avoid the questions she wasn’t prepared to answer at the moment.

She obviously failed because Mercedes added with a smirk, “Clearly not enough.”

\-----

Ken Tanaka was back. He was sitting dangerously close to Shelby. Dangerous, because of the glares Holly kept throwing him ever since he sat down in front of Shelby. The same glares he was oblivious to. 

Rachel genuinely feared for his life. Santana was delighted, like a kid waiting for presents on her birthday.

And her present came. In the form of Holly calling out Tanaka when his unwelcomed-yet-un-chastised Totally Gratuitous Touching of Shelby reached its peak level (his hand was resting on Shelby’s right thigh for a quite a while), “I think you should leave.” 

Visibly offended, he stood up and retorted back, “I think you should mind your own business.”

Shelby quickly said, “ _Holly_ ,” in a tone not different from how she says Jake’s name whenever he was doing something idiotic and she wanted him to stop right at that instant.

Holly rolled her eyes at Shelby and walked out of the house, visibly upset. She slammed the door loudly on her way out. The guests were stunned into silence. No one knew—or, more accurately, no one was brave enough to voice out their thoughts—as to what happened.

Santana looked at Rachel knowingly as if to say, _I told you so_. Rachel rolled her eyes in disgust at Santana’s childishness and in disbelief at her mother’s pride in refusing to follow Holly.  

 _Well, if she won’t, then I will_ , Rachel thought. She gingerly followed Holly and threw her mother a glare.

\-----

Rachel found Holly in the Pierce house, washing dishes in the kitchen sink. She was clearly mad about something.

“Hi,” Rachel said.

Holly faced her and gave her a pointed look. “What are you doing here?”

_An angry Holly is a scary Holly._

Rachel gathered all the confidence she could muster and said, “You’re clearly upset about something and I’m here to talk about it.” She added bravely, “Because mom is letting her pride get the better of her.”

Hearing that made Holly smile a little. Rachel was more than relieved that she was on the right track.

Holly stopped washing the dishes, wiped her hands on a towel by the sink, and opened two bottles of beer from the fridge. She offered one to Rachel.

With Holly being as scary as she was at the moment, Rachel did not dare refuse the offer. She took it and sat on the kitchen stool facing Holly.

“So what do you want to know?” Holly asked. She was never known for beating around the bush.

 _So this is it, then._ Rachel took a deep breath, looked her in the eye and said, “Are you dating mom?”

Holly chuckled, to Rachel’s surprise. “ _Dating_? Really, that’s what you wanted to know?” 

Defensive, Rachel said, “I don’t know!” She was blushing. Knowing your parents have sex is one thing but knowing your recently widowed mother might be more than kissing another woman is another thing.

Holly found Rachel’s reaction amusing. She said with a smile, “To answer your question, no, we’re not dating as of the moment.”

“So you did?”

Holly shrugged.

“Are you and mom… you know,” she hedged, afraid to ask the right question and more afraid of the answer.

She looked at Rachel with all seriousness and said, “I don’t know what you mean by ‘you know,’” she slightly rolled her eyes, “but if you want to know if I love your mom, yes I do.” 

“Love as in _love-love_?”

“Love _love_ , yes.”

Like the shiva guests back at their house, Rachel was stunned into silence. She couldn’t grasp the _reality_ that another woman is in love with her mother.

Holly added, “But as to the question, if your mother loves me back, I am not completely sure of the answer.”

“Does she know?”

“Yes, I’ve told her.” With a sigh, Holly said, “And she said now is not the right time.”

“How long has this been going on?”

“A long time,” she admitted. She looked outside the window, towards the Berry residence. “It’s always been there, for us. Since we have known each other.”

“Does Dad know?”

She sighed. “I don’t know for sure but I have a feeling he has an idea.” She added, “Hiram spoke to me in the hospital…the night before he died. He mentioned how…stubborn Shelby could get and that I should just…hold on and keep being there for her.”  She took a deep breath and looked at Rachel with sad eyes, “And I do. I _want_ to be there for her. Always. But sometimes…when one keeps giving and not getting _anything_ in return _…_ not even a sign that what you’re doing is right or appreciated…at least, the way you want it to…it gets harder to convince oneself to stay.”

Rachel was at a loss for words. She could see and feel how defeated Holly is. She wanted to help her, to ease her frustration, her sadness, but she knew any word would not be enough as long as it did not come from Shelby. She doesn’t drink beer but it was a great a moment as any to make an exception.

Rachel stayed with Holly until dinnertime. They talked about their families’ shared history—Brittany and Santana, and Hiram, Shelby and Holly—and what to expect in the future—neither of them had a clue what to expect from Shelby. In the course of their conversation, Rachel shared her recent interactions with Quinn. This, again, did not surprise Holly. She only said, “You have always been _interested_ in that girl when you guys were in high school.”

“Before Finn told me that he was having a baby, I was content in taking it slow with Quinn. See where the chips fall.” She fixed the non-existent crease on her dress before continuing, “But _after_ , I felt _cheated_. By the universe, by the circumstances. I wanted to get back on my feet immediately. I wanted Quinn and me to progress _quickly_. But I know I’m not ready.” Finally, she said with a sigh, “I don’t know what to do with her.”

Holly quietly observed her before replying, “You have to figure out what _you_ want first. I guess it’s time for you to be selfish. To _want_ your own happiness and do everything you can to get it.”

\----

The entire conversation with Holly left Rachel convinced that it doesn’t matter what age one is—be it Jake’s twenty-eight or Holly’s nearly sixty—women can still run roughshod over one’s heart. Before the conversation with Holly, Rachel found it terrifying, but after, she was oddly reassured. Reassured enough to go _Pages_ and visit Quinn.

The light in the store was dim, and there was a sign at the door that says ‘Closed.’ Rachel knocked and stepped in.

“Hi,” she said shyly. “I hope I didn’t catch you at a bad time.”

“Hello there.” Quinn sounded pleased to see Rachel, much to brunette’s relief.

“I was just closing up,” she replied. “Have you had dinner?”

Rachel shook her head. The bottles of beer she shared with Holly kept her mind clear but with a distant buzz.

“Perfect.” Quinn smirked. “I feel like cooking you something.”

She smiled nervously.

Quinn locked up the store, and Rachel waited for her outside. She was thankful for the cool breeze that kept her from sweating profusely. She kept switching her weight on both feet.

“Rach, you ready to go?” the blonde asked the Million Dollar Question.

Rachel knew and understood that there was no going back once she says yes. She remembered Holly and her doubts. _No one deserved that kind of pain. The pain brought about by uncertainty._ To Quinn, she nodded.

She must’ve been visibly nervous because Quinn took her hands in hers, and said, “Anything can happen, Rach, but first you must let it.”

Quinn always did have her way of calming Rachel’s nerves. Be it before a competition performance or during Prom or before she left Lima to go to NYADA. Then and now, it has always been Quinn.

\-----

Thankfully, Quinn does not live with her mom, despite going back to take care of her. She lives in a quaint, three-bedroom house, just a few blocks from the old Fabray house. The street it was on is quiet and secluded. _Much like Quinn_ , Rachel thought.

There are framed movie posters on the walls—Audrey Hepburn, Marilyn Monroe, Humphrey Bogart, Charlie Chaplin, even—and not very much in the way of furniture: a mucous-green leather couch that she must have gotten a deal on because no one would choose that color in a vacuum. There’s no matching love seat, which Rachel found somewhat symbolic. Rachel felt relieved that there were no pets of some sort. _One less living thing to convince about the merits of this relationship_ , Rachel thought.

To say that Rachel was nervous was an understatement. She has not have sex with any other human being, male or female, in six-almost-seven years, maybe more. When your husband spent the last year of your marriage going elsewhere for his sexual gratification, it’s only natural to have some performance anxiety.

Quinn stepped into the house, tossed keys, and flipped off lights.

 _Didn’t she say she was cooking?_  To Rachel’s inexperienced mind, cooking necessarily involved more lights on.

She stood uncertainly in the doorway. “Should I come in?”  Her voice sounds hollow and scared.

Quinn gives Rachel a sharp, knowing smile. “If I were you, I would.”

They skipped dinner.

\-----

After they were finished, the bedroom (like my life, Rachel thinks) was a mess—clothes everywhere, an overturned vase, sheets pulled off.

Rachel was staring at the ceiling, while Quinn’s back was turned to her. She appeared to be sleeping soundly. This makes Rachel think she has done something good and right. She had worked on instincts and a vague memory of a drunken experiment with a budding film major named Sarah when she was in NYADA. But as a performer and consummate professional, Rachel wanted to know how she did in her first sober experience in making love to a woman. Questions rang in her head. 

Rachel almost jumped out of her skin when she heard Quinn say, “Don’t freak out.”

“I’m not,” she replied, looking at the ceiling, clutching at the sheets covering her body.

“You’re definitely freaking out.”

Rachel could hear the smile in her voice. She said defensively, “How do you know you can’t even see me?”

Quinn chuckled, and rolled to face Rachel. She whispered in the brunette’s ear, “Oh, I see you Rachel Berry. I’ve always seen you.”

 _It’s time to be selfish_ , Rachel thought with a smile before letting sleep claim her.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry if I skipped the Faberry sexy times part! I don't know how to write smut, forgive me!


	8. Of conversations that need to be had

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rachel gets a little enlightenment from Emma, Shelby and Puck.

**Chapter 7 | _Of conversations that need to be had_**

 

On the supposed seventh day of shiva, Rabbi Jacob came over the Berry residence early morning to inform the family that, “The laws of shiva are suspended on Saturdays. All outward signs of mourning put aside in honor of the Sabbath.”

Puck groaned. What could have been the last day of his sacrifice was lengthened.

For Jake, any break was good news. But before he could celebrate, Rabbi Jacob added, “You are still in mourning, of course. But there will be no visitors today, no outward observance of shiva.”

“So, it’s like a day off,” Santana commented.

“Not quite,” he said. He looked at Shelby, who nodded, and then looked back at us. “This morning, you’ll all come to temple to say Kaddish at morning services.”

“Kaddish?” It was Jake.

“The prayer for the soul of the departed.”

“Why can’t we say it here?” Puck argued.

“Kaddish is said responsively. It can only be said with a minyan, a quorum of at least ten men present to respond.”

Puck looked at his childhood friend exasperatedly.

Rabbi Jacob just looked back at him and shrugged. “I don’t make the rules, brother.”

\-----

Rachel’s car just pulled up just as Rabbi Jacob got out of their house. Not wanting to be asked where she was and why she didn’t spend the night, she let him leave before going out of her car.

All too happy at escaping Rabbi Jacob’s disapproving looks and maybe some of his leering too, if they were to go by his past actions, she completely did not see Emma sitting on the side of the porch, on the balustrade, quietly drinking her coffee.

“Hey, Emma. Didn’t see you there,” Rachel said, upon seeing her. She had her hair up in a messy bun and she was sort of wearing a sweatshirt and jogging pants. The most dressed down Rachel had ever seen her. Something was clearly bothering the redhead, but Rachel was in no mood for conversation—about her whereabouts or other people’s lives—so she started to walk past her. “I’ll just go—”

Then she heard Emma call out, “Hey Rach.”

 _That didn’t sound like it was a good kind of Rach._ She nervously turned around. “Yes?” She walked back to where Emma was.

Emma looked her in the eye and asked, “What would you say the odds are that your brother had sex with that Kitty girl while we’ve been here?” There’s no anger in her voice, just sad resignation.

Rachel didn’t answer immediately. Her eye contact faltered.

“I know he’s your brother but I could use a friend here. To tell me if I’m crazy or not. Between you and me and the sunrise.”

Emma was considerably older than Rachel, but there’s something of a frightened child in her, some ancient, lingering pain that has never been soothed. At that moment, Rachel hated her youngest brother. For inflicting that pain, or building on it, if it was already there when they met. “Between you, me, and the sunrise,” Rachel repeated, weighing her options.

“Yes,” the redhead simply said. When one is looking into Emma’s eyes, one can see that she was prepared for the worst answer that Rachel could possibly give.

Rachel saw a bit of herself in Emma. The scorned lover, the one who is left seeking answers to questions that she was never prepared to ask. Finally, she sighed and said truthfully, “The odds are pretty good.”

Emma took a deep breath. The tears slid quietly down her cheeks. “Thank you, for the honesty,” she managed to whisper.

Rachel couldn’t help but say, “I’m sorry. I know how badly it hurts.”

Emma nodded as if to say it was okay. Even if it clearly wasn’t. “I am a grown up person. I am smart. I have my shit together.” She sighed. “And your brother is a _child_.” 

Rachel couldn’t agree more. “Yeah.”

“He has spent his life reeling in the slack as fast as you guys can cut it for him.” Emma looked away, out on the street. Hoping the find the answers in the quiet morning. “It’s my own damn fault, really. Whatever lies he’s told me, they pale in comparison to the lies I’ve been telling myself.”

“You deserve better than him. I love him, but that’s the truth.”

Again, she nodded. Rachel wasn’t sure if Emma believed her.

Rachel asked, “So, what are you going to do?”

Emma looked at her and replied, “I’ll wait until the shiva ends. That seems only right. Then I’ll gather up the tattered remnants of my dignity and say goodbye.”

“He’ll be crushed. You know that, right?”

“I’ll let him keep the Porsche.”

“Wow,” Rachel said, surprised at this woman’s kindness and net worth. “Parting gifts.”

“Yeah, but he keeps leaving it unlocked with the keys in it. He’s bound to lose it anyway. Jake is not built to keep things.” Emma said the last part with sadness in her eyes. Like a child letting go of a dream. She added, “And besides, I know he meant well. I’m forty-four years old. I don’t have time for anger anymore.”

Rachel couldn’t believe at Jake’s luck at finding what could possibly be the most mature woman in this side of the world. “You may be the best person I’ve ever known,” she uttered. “I am going to hug you now,” she warned. She reached out and hugged Emma.

After the brief hug, Rachel joked, “Where were you when my life was falling into pieces?”

“I’m always available.” Emma fumbled around in her pocket and came up with a slightly crumpled but still decent business card. It says her name, followed by a slew of acronyms. Below that it says board-certified psychotherapist, and below that it says life coach. And right below that, in boldfaced type, it says this: have a plan.

Rachel read out loud, “Have a plan.”

“Do you?”

“Whatever the opposite of a plan is, that’s what I’ve got,” she admitted with an embarrassed chuckle.

“Can I offer you a piece of unsolicited advice?”

“Sure.”

Emma put her hand on Rachel’s arm. “You married your high school sweetheart. You’re terrified of being alone. Anything you do now will be motivated by that fear. You have to stop worrying about finding love again. It will come when it comes. Get comfortable with being alone. It will empower you.”

“Empower me to do what?”

“To be the person you want to be. And then you’ll be ready to make a plan.”

Rachel nodded, her mind going a mile a minute. _So much for avoiding Rabbi Jacob_.

For the first time in seven days, Rachel appreciated shiva. If not for this tradition, she wouldn’t have met and talked to the troubled but kind soul that is Emma. She silently cursed at her brother for being a man-child and not a decent human being Emma deserved.

“Emma, you’re not the first woman who wanted to believe in Jake,” she sighed, “but you’re far and away the best one.” 

\-----

Rachel was prepared to sneak past the breakfast hall, and go straight to the basement to change, but Sugar saw her. Sugar waved at her, catching everybody’s attention.

_Damn you, Sugar._

Rachel took a seat beside Jake.

“Where’s your suit?” Jake asked.

Rachel looked at everyone. “Why would I need one?”

Santana replied, “Apparently we’re going to temple. Jewfro sold mom on it. Apparently we have to say a prayer for dad’s soul.”

“Can’t do that here huh?” she almost whispered.

Puck leaned towards her and said, “Trust me, I already asked all the right questions.”

Shelby comes in the dining area in a business suit of sorts—blazer and skirt. “Oh Rachel, there you are. You didn’t tell anyone where you disappeared to yesterday.”

“It’s because I don’t want to. But if you must know I stayed at Holly’s until dinner. We talked. Because someone refused to,” she said, hoping that her mom would drop the subject at the mention of Holly.

“And after that? Don’t tell me you slept there, too.”

“No, and it’s nobody’s business.”

“Except Quinn’s,” Jake whispered.

Rachel glared at her youngest brother. “Shut up, Jake.”

But Shelby heard it and was not going to let it go. “Quinn Fabray? There’s always been something different with that girl. A quiet sense of dignity.” Shelby said approvingly, “She did go back to take care of her mother after she got divorced. Helped her while she was dealing with alcoholism I heard.”

“Let’s not talk about Quinn and her mom when she’s not here.”

“Then you must invite her over for dinner?” Shelby suggested nonchalantly, to Santana’s amusement.

Rachel felt this was spiraling out of her control. She quickly interjected, “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”

Santana added, with mirth, “I agree. They did just sleep together last night so…”

Rachel choked on her coffee.

Thankfully, their mother just looked at Santana disapprovingly, and rubbed Rachel’s back. She quickly dropped the topic out of the blue, and reminded everyone, “Finish your breakfast, and get dressed. I expect everyone who came out of my womb to come with me to the temple. We leave in an hour.”

\-----

Since Rachel was not prepared for temple, Shelby lent her a dress and a blazer to go with it.

They were in Shelby’s room. Rachel was looking at herself in the mirror, when she heard her mom say, “So Quinn Fabray.”

“Yes.” She looked at her mom through the mirror, “Surprised?”

“Not completely, considering how smitten you are with her when you were children. Not to mention the whole nose job fiasco.”

Rachel blushed. “But you know…with Finn and everything…I’m not entirely sure what I’m doing…”

Her conversation with Holly the night before, and Emma this morning greatly helped Rachel make up her mind as regards Quinn, but she figured, getting her mother’s input wouldn’t hurt.

Shelby sighed, as she absentmindedly picked lint off Rachel’s blazer, “Well, there are first loves and great loves. The latter one is the kind of love that never goes away. You can forget about them for awhile, because you’re preoccupied with other things…having children…making a family…but when all of it is finished…when they have all grown up and living their own lives, you are left with yours. When the chaos dies down and you are left to focus on yourself. That’s when you realize, that it’s still there; the feeling for that one special person. It never went away.”

Rachel had a hunch that it was less about her and Quinn than it is about Shelby and Holly. She knew her mother knew the right answer, but like Emma that morning, she just needed a little push. For the second time that day, she asked, “So what are you going to do about yours?”

Shelby looked at her third born daughter, her mini-me. “She told you?”

“Mom, I know. Yesterday’s talk with Holly only confirmed what Santana and I thought all along.”

“Santana, too?”

“Mom her gaydar’s more accurate than mine.”

Shelby chuckled nervously.

Rachel was not about to let her mom divert the conversation. “She does love you, Mom, you know.”

“I know, honey.”

“And I’m sure dad would have loved for you to have someone.”

“He knew. I know he did, but he never said a thing.”

Rachel said, “Dad knowing and not saying anything doesn’t mean he disapproved of it. Maybe he didn’t want to stress you out by letting you know that he knows.”

“Ah, classic Hiram,” she said wistfully.

Rachel let her mother ponder on that thought for awhile.

Then Shelby asked, “How are you holding up?”

“Aside from my horrendous living situation,” Rachel joked. “Every day I miss Dad. Knowing he was always there. Someone I can run to, not to discuss my problems but someone I could sit on the porch with, share a cup of coffee and let the afternoon pass. Not talking, just existing. I miss that.”

Shelby engulfed Rachel in her arms. “You’re going to be okay.”

“I know.”

“No, you don’t, but I do.”

Rachel asked, “How are you so okay?”

“I think with every passing day I start to remember him less as the angry, sick patient but more as the strong and vibrant man I was married to all those years.”

Rachel noticed the use of the phrase ‘married to’ not ‘in love with.’ Maybe their father was never really their mother’s greatest love. But Rachel realized that it did not matter as long as Shelby was happy.

Shelby added with a chuckle, “Plus I’ve been popping Xanax like tictacs.”

\-----

The service at the temple did go uneventfully to everyone’s relief.

Since they had the day off from shiva, the family decided to spend time at the pool. Andrew and Cole were only too happy to be enjoying the water. Cole wore Spider-Man water wings on his arms to keep him afloat, but he relied mostly on his Uncle Jake. Andrew is engaged in an endless cycle of jumping in off the side and then climbing out to jump in again.

Emma was sitting quietly in a lounge chair, the farthest from the pool, reading a book. She seemed to be ignoring everyone else.

Santana and Rachel also sat on lounge chairs, near the pool in case there’s an emergency with the kids. The older Berry daughter was flipping through a tabloid magazine, while the younger Berry played with her phone.

The sun is just receding beyond the perimeter of the yard, and the mosquitoes haven’t yet emerged. It’s the best time to be outside.

“My God, I’m fat,” Santana said as she looked through pictures of starving starlets.

“You just had a baby, give yourself a break.”

“I had a baby a year ago. I’ve been dieting and running every day, and everything in my strike zone still feels like the blob. I won’t even change in front of Sebastian.”

“I feel like I’ve put on some weight myself since I left Finn,” Rachel commiserated with her sister.

Santana never really passed up on an opportunity to be critical of anyone, most especially her actress-sister. “You are looking a little soft in the middle there. You may want to watch that. After all, you’re going to be getting naked in front of women now.”

“ _Santana_!” Rachel blushed.

“You haven’t told me how last night with Quinn went.”

“I will never tell you anything,” Rachel swore, still blushing.

Emma, overhearing their conversation, was smiling, despite her mood.

Santana saw this, and said, “See, even Emma wants to know!”

Rachel stood up and walked away from Santana’s threats of, “Fine, be that way! I will find out though.”

\-----

Rachel found solace from the heat and Santana in the kitchen, where Puck was. He was in board shorts and a dri-fit shirt. Not exactly pool material but already bit laid back for his style.

“Hello, Noah.”

He tried his best to smile. “Hi, Rach.”

“How are you big brother?” she said, inching closer to her brother, who was leaning against the kitchen countertop, looking out into the pool.

“Fine, I guess.”

“And the leg?” Rachel never fails to ask her brother this question. She refused to ignore her brother’s limp and all memories associated with it.

“It aches sometimes, but it's not a pain I can't handle.”

Silence.

"So...you and Finn are really done?"

“Yes.” She nodded. “He's having a kid."

“With the...” his question died on his lips.

Again, Rachel nodded. “Yep, with the same woman he cheated on me with." 

“ _Jesus Christ_."

Rachel chuckled at her eldest brother’s reaction. “Yeah. He's wanted to be a dad since we got married. And that was never one of my priorities, really.”

Silence.

They walked outside to the pool. They looked at Santana passing off her youngest son to Sugar so she can go back to reading her magazine.

“Santana has ruined being parents for us, right?” Puck observed. 

Rachel chuckled. She looked at Sugar, who's making silly faces at Cole who loves them. He kept laughing at his aunt's ridiculous reactions.

She said, “Noah, out of the three of us—you, me and Jake—I think you have a much better chance at changing that.”

Puck said nothing. His eyes remained on his wife carrying his nephew. After some time, Sugar seemed to notice and looked at their direction. She raised a hand and waved at them. She even blew her husband a kiss. It was cheesy to Rachel but the smile threatening to break out on her brother's face told her that Puck disagreed.

Puck said, more to himself than Rachel, “Maybe.”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're familiar with both the book and the movie, I hope you're not in any offended (or upset maybe?) that I left out the getting high at the temple thing. I felt it had no purpose in the story I was telling. Ciao!


	9. The End of the Beginning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In this last one, we see Shelby and her children end shiva. Hopefully, they all reflect on how good shiva was in not only properly mourning a lost loved one, but also in mending their weary souls.

**Chapter 8 | _The End of the Beginning_**

 

Rabbi Jacob came over to officially end the shiva. He asked all of the immediate mourners to sit down on the low chairs one last time. Once he had the Berry children and Shelby seated, he sat down on one of the folding chairs and spoke as if he was reading from a script.

“For the last week, this has been a house of mourning.”

“You’ve taken solace in each other, and from the community. Of course your grief doesn’t end with the shiva. In fact, the harder part is ahead: going back to your regular lives, to a world without your husband and your father. And just as you have comforted each other here this week, you must continue to look in on each other, especially your mother, to talk about Hiram, to keep his memory alive, to know you are not alone.”

Rabbi Jacob stood. “The following two passages are from the book of Isaiah: _No more will your sun set, nor your moon be darkened, for God will be an eternal light for you and your days of mourning shall end. Like a man whose mother consoles him, so shall I console you, and you shall be consoled in Jerusalem._ ”

All the Berry children looked at Rabbi Jacob expectantly, like graduates waiting to throw their caps.

“Now,” he said, grinning away the formality. “Please stand up.”

Shelby and her children stood up, and the shiva was over. Everyone was glad that it was over but sorry to see it go. They understood that they love each other but couldn’t handle being around each other for very long. It’s a miracle they managed to survive the past seven days.

“It’s now customary for all of the immediate family to leave the house together,” Rabbi Jacob said.

“And go where?” asked Puck.

“Just take a walk around the block.”

“What for?” Rachel asked.

“For the last seven days, you have been apart from the world, focusing on death. Taking a walk outside reestablishes your connection to the living.”

“So, just walk around the block?” Rachel again.

“Yes,” Rabbi Jacob said, slightly getting annoyed. “That would be great.”

It’s cooler than expected outside, bright and blustery, the first winds of autumn whispering through the leaves. Shelby walked between Jake and Rachel, lacing her arms through theirs, adding a procession-like quality to the stroll. Puck and Santana fall awkwardly into step behind them, hands jammed into their pockets for warmth.

“So, what’s next for you?” Puck asked his sister.

“I don’t really know,” she answered truthfully. Santana did not know if Sebastian leaving in the middle of shiva meant something to their relationship. Was it a sign of the impending end of their marriage? Or was it just a normal break in their long and arduous journey as husband and wife?

“Well, if there’s anything I could do,” Puck offered.

Santana saw this as the perfect opportunity to bring up their youngest brother. “What about Jake?”

“What about him?”

“He needs a job.”

“Well, Rach needs a job, too,” Puck hedged.

“I’ll sign over my share if you hire him,” Santana offered.

The two older Berry walked in silence for a bit.

“Dad always had a soft spot for him, didn’t he?” Puck asked.

Santana nodded. “He was everything Dad wasn’t.”

“Crazy, you mean.”

“Loud. Warm. Emotional. Dad liked us because we were kind of like him. He liked Jake because he wasn’t anything like him.”

Puck sighed. “So what are we talking about here?”

“Dad’s gone,” Santana stated. “And along with the business, we inherit the business of bailing out Jake.”

Again, Puck sighed. Deeper than the last one. “Here’s the deal. You keep your share and I’ll bring in Jake on a trial basis. But when it comes to him screwing up, you and I are partners. Fifty-fifty. Deal?”

Santana smirked, and shook Puck’s hand. “Deal.”

Even if it was not a discussion of their personal and much bigger problems as a family man or a family woman, but the eldest son and daughter of Hiram Berry will take it. It was the most meaningful conversation they had in years.

\-----

As Rachel walked by her mother, letting Jake walk back into the house without them, she asked the question that has been in her mind since the first day of shiva, "It was you who wanted us to sit shiva, right? Not dad."

"Smart kid," was all Shelby said.

Rachel couldn't help but smile at her mother's scheming but brilliant ways. "I will let that be our little secret."

In hindsight, as Rachel watched everyone end their walk, and slowly go back inside the house to share a meal, she realized that their family needed seven days to sit together and spend time with each other under one roof. To mend ties that were nearly broken, strengthen the ones that managed to survive despite the years apart, and build new ones for the future.

\-----

Before they start breakfast, Emma said her goodbyes. Jake, unashamedly, cried openly as he ran after her and tried to convince her not to go—only reinforcing Rachel's and Emma's shared observation that the youngest Berry man was a child. Emma looked very much like the dignified woman that she is.

Rachel watched them say goodbye through the window, from her seat at the table.

Jake seemed to be placated by the fact that Emma was leaving the Porsche to him. He hugged her and walked back to the house with a little bounce in his step. "It was a mutual decision. And, she left me the car," he announced at the table when he sat. 

Santana whistled.

Puck smirked.

Shelby said, "Good for you."

Rachel chuckled. She had the hunch that after a week or so of moping, Jake will get over Emma. He'd probably treat the whole thing like a dream or a UFO sighting, something he'll talk about one day when he's drunk and among friends, but nothing that has any real bearing on his actual life.

\-----

As everyone settled down to eat breakfast after the whole Jake-Emma thing, Shelby nonchalantly informed her children and everyone present at the table that, "Me and Holly are dating."

Santana raised an eyebrow, and nodded at Rachel, as if to say 'I told you so.'

Jake chuckled, and offered his palm up to his mother for a high five.

Shelby chastised him with a smile, "Jacob, let's not be Neanderthals about this, okay."

Rachel just smiled proudly. She nodded at Holly, who raised her coffee cup in response. Holly mouthed, _Thank you_.

Puck was a bit flustered that everyone already knew, except him. He was so surprised that his wife elbowed him to get himself out of the shock he was in. He cleared his throat, looked around, and looked at Shelby, at Holly, and then back at Shelby. "I guess I am speaking in behalf of everyone when I say that...um...we are happy for both of you, and we wish you both good luck." _Ever the dutiful first born son._

Rachel raised her cup to toast the new couple, and everyone followed. Even Andrew and Cole raised their sippy cups in glee.

It was all Shelby could ask for.

\-----

Everyone gathered on the porch to say goodbye to Santana, Andrew and Cole. Shelby cried, knowing it would long before she will see them again.

Rachel saw Santana clip the back of Jake's head, as if he was one of her petulant children. _Possibly for Emma_ , she thought. Santana said more words to Jake that Rachel could not make out. Nor did she try. Those two always had some sort of maternal bond. Jake listened to Santana more than he would like to admit. 

Santana and Puck just shared a brief hug, and a promise that Puck will take care of everyone that Santana will leave behind—including mom, Holly, Sugar, Jake and Britt.

Speaking of the blonde, she and Santana shared a quiet moment, and a really long hug. _A hug that spoke sentences, if there was one,_ Rachel thought.

Rachel saw her sister quickly wipe her tears before they fell. She was reminded of her mother's speech on first loves and great loves. It was highly likely that Britt was both for Santana.

When it was Rachel's turn, Santana's only words were, "Stop being a wuss, Rach. Stop worrying about other people and do things you want to do before you regret them."

Rachel hugged her sister, and nodded.

\-----

Shelby, Jake, Puck, Sugar and Brittany were still at the table, eating a lavish brunch comprised of shiva leftovers. Jake was currently telling a story that has them gasping and laughing.

Rachel watched them for a moment, unseen from the hallway, and then step quietly down the hall to the front door. For reasons Rachel doesn’t fully understand, being at the center of another tangle of goodbye hugs and well-wishes was more than she could handle right now. Shelby will definitely cry, which will only make Rachel cry, and she thought she has cried enough for the week. 

“Making good your escape, I see.”

Rachel turned to see Holly, standing at the foot of the stairs, smoking.

“No, I was just—”

“It’s okay,” she said softly. “Seven days is a lot of togetherness. Come give me a hug.” She wrapped her arms around Rachel and kissed her once on each cheek.

“I’m happy for you and Mom,” she whispered.

“Really? It’s not too weird for you?” She blushed a little.

“It’s good weird.”

Holly looked over Rachel fondly, appraising her. “You look better than when you first got here.”

“Then I just lost a husband, now I think I may have a girlfriend.” Rachel grinned.

Holly grinned, too. “Don't be a stranger, Rach.”

"I won't. I promise." Rachel stepped closer to Holly for another hug.

Holly said, when they parted, "Say hi to Quinn for me."

Rachel blushed. Holly always did go straight to the point.

\-----

Rachel found Quinn in her bookshop. The store was quiet, like always, with a faint sound of a radio being played in the background.

 _Well, that's new,_ Rachel observed.

She saw Quinn by the cash register. She looked up from what she was reading, and smiled upon seeing Rachel. "Hey there, Rachel Berry."

Rachel felt her spine tingle at the sound of her name being uttered by Quinn. _Well, that's_ not _new_ , she thought to herself. Quinn always had that effect on her, and she has learned to accept it.

"Is everything okay?" Quinn asked.

Before Rachel lost her courage, she blurted out, "My mom is in love. The specifics are very, very hard to explain but she's in love."

Quinn didn't know where Rachel was going with this. "Well, good for her, then."

"In the seven days that we did shiva for my dad, I realized something," Rachel went on. "I've always planned my life. For the past six almost seven years, I've been busy chasing this idea of a perfect life…my dream job, dream house, dream guy, even.” Rachel found herself rolling her eyes at that.

Quinn chuckled.

Rachel continued, “Well, life is not, and it shouldn't be perfect. It is unpredictable, irrational, and complicated."

Rachel sighed. "And I want a complicated life, with someone I love."

Quinn didn't say anything, but Rachel could see that she was worried. Her brows were knitted together.

"And to be honest, I’m scared. I am not sure if it's going to work out with you. Because hello, I'm emotionally overbearing, and you're...you… _the_ Quinn Fabray."

Quinn raised an eyebrow.

"You're strange. Great strange. And you're good." Rachel took a deep breath. "And conversations with Emma, my brother’s former shrink and ex-girlfriend, my mom and Holly, that’s her girlfriend by the way. Didn’t I tell you she’s in love with a woman—”

“Rach,” Quinn said, to stop Rachel from going off-topic.

“What I’m saying is, I think I’m ready. To try and be complicated with you.”

Quinn released the breath she realized she was holding. She opened her arms and Rachel rushed into them. Rachel hugged her and kissed her on the lips, hard.

When they parted to come up for air, Quinn teased, “For a second there I thought you were saying goodbye.”

“Never,” Rachel said. “It’s time to be selfish.”

They kissed again, with Cyndi Lauper singing in the background. _If you're lost, you can look, and you will find me, time after time. If you fall, I will catch you, I will be waiting. Time after time._  

 

_**The End** _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Three chapters in 24 hours!
> 
> Thank you for everyone who took time to read this, my first ever complete multi-chapter fic!!! 
> 
> Thank you to Jonathan Tropper for the story, Ryan Murphy for the characters, and Shawn Levy for the movie. You've all been wonderful albeit unwilling inspirations, as I started and finished this work. I hope to start a new multi-chapter fic sooner than the two years it took me to finish this thing. 
> 
> Again, thank you for reading!


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